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Abstract. The virions of vesicular stomatitis virus contain an enzyme that catalyzes the incorporation of ribonucleotides into RNA. The product of the reaction is mainly RNA complementary in base sequence to that of vesicular stomatitis virus RNA.Introduction. Two considerations led us to search for an RNA polymerase in the virion of vesicular stomatitis virus, a single-stranded RNA virus. First, the lack of infectivity of vesicular stomatitis virus RNA,I which contrasts with the readily demonstrable infectivity of RNA from arboviruses2 or picornaviruses,3 could be explained by an obligate requirement for a virion polymerase in order to initiate a vesicular stomatitis virus infection. Second, the recent finding that the messenger RNA's that synthesize vesicular stomatitis virus proteins are complementary to the nucleotide sequence of the virion RNA4 led us to wonder how the initial stages of the infection proceed: if the virion RNA is not a messenger, then it must be able to serve as template for messenger RNA synthesis using either a polymerase found in the host cell or one that is a part of the virion.Two precedents exist for the association of an RNA polymerase with the virion of an animal virus. One is the finding of a DNA-dependent RNA polymerase in vaccinia virions.5 The second is the finding of an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase in the virions of reovirus6 and other double-stranded RNA viruses.7Materials and Methods. Purified B particles8 of vesicular stomatitis virus, the

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