Figure 1
Western blot analyses of OptiPrep purified HERV particles from MS 1946 long-term, lymphoblastoid cell cultures. Anti-HERV-H/-W Env TM and SU antibodies were raised in New Zealand white rabbits against 17-mer peptides localised at specific, but equivalent positions in the Env ORFs of HERV-H env62/H19 (Env H1TM: aa489-505; Env H3SU: aa 370-386) and of syncytin 1 (Env W1TM: aa415-431, Env W3SU: aa301-317). Size markers are shown to the left. TM, SU -- anti-HERV Env TM/SU serum; PTM, PSU -- appropriate pre-immune control sera. A. Flow cytometric analysis of surface expression of HERV-H Env and HERV-W Env TM and SU epitopes on cells from MS 1946 long-term lymphoblastoid cell cultures. The grey peaks represent the fluorescence of cells incubated with human IgG; the peaks with dashed line represent fluorescence of the cells incubated with pre-immune serum and FITC goat anti-rabbit antibodies; and the peaks with solid line represent fluorescence of the cells incubated with anti-HERV-H/-W Env TM/SU anti-sera and FITC goat anti-rabbit antibodies. Fluorescence indices are calculated as the ratio of the mean fluorescence of the cells incubated with anti-Env Abs to the mean fluorescence of the cells incubated with the appropriate control (pre-immune serum).