Rev‐dependency of expression of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 gag and env genes

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Abstract
Structural gene expression of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV‐1) requires a viral regulatory protein, Rev transactivator. We investigated Rev‐dependency of HIV‐1 gene expression by various reporter systems. Expression of unspliced and singly‐spliced viral mRNAs was demonstrated to be differentially dependent on the Rev function. This difference of Rev‐dependency was found not to be determined by cis‐elements in gag, pol, and env coding sequences reported so far, and was lost when the reporter constructs containing minimum elements for Rev‐responsiveness such as splice signals and rev responsive element were used for experiments. These findings indicated that fundamental structure of HIV‐1 mRNA was critical for the differential regulation of gene expression by Rev transactivator.