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Identification of New Endogenous Retroviral Sequences Belonging to the HERV-W Family in Human Cancer Cells

A human endogenous retroviral family (HERV-W) has recently been identified on chromosome 7 that contains a single complete open reading frame putatively encoding an envelope protein. We have identified fifteen HERV-W families on human genomic DNA using a monochromosomal panel in our previous study. In order to identify additional families, we examined genomic DNA derived from cancer cell lines (A549, AZ521, OVCAR3, RT4) using the PCR approach. Five env fragments of a HERV-W family were newly identified and analyzed. They showed a high degree of nucleotide sequence similarity (93–97%) to that of the other HERV-W families. Translation of the env fragments showed no frameshift and termination codon by deletion/insertion or point mutation in clones A549-2, AZ521-3, and OVCAR-3. The ratio of synonymous to nonsynonymous substitutions indicated that negative selective pressure is acting on A549-2, AZ521-3, and OVCAR-3 sequences. These env gene sequences could be associated with an active provirus in human cancer cells (A549, AZ521, OVCAR3).