Physical mapping of vaccinia virus temperature-sensitive mutations.

DNA restriction fragments from the Copenhagen strain of vaccinia virus have been molecularly cloned into the plasmid pAT 153. Eleven fragments obtained with SalI and nine fragments with HindIII together overlap about 90% of the 190 kb genome. The positioning of SalI and XhoI restriction sites demonstrated that vaccinia Copenhagen DNA differs in a number of sites from other vaccinia strains. Vaccinia temperature-sensitive mutants in 17 different complementation groups have been mapped to specific regions on the viral genome by marker rescue with cloned restriction fragments of the wild type strain. As a rule, the physical order of the mutations corresponded to the genetic order previously established from recombination data. The results have thus enabled the proper alignment of the genetic and physical maps and provided a means of comparing intervals expressed on these two scales. All ts mutations that have been mapped so far lie within a central region that spans approximately 60% of the genome. This clustering of mutations confirms and extends previous observations suggesting that the majority of the genes required for viral multiplication under in vitro conditions are located in the highly conserved central region of the orthopoxvirus genome.