Abstract A preparation of the Bryan high-titer strain of Rous sarcoma virus (RSV) was found to consist of two antigenically distinct variants, designated as RSV-1 and RSV-2. RSV-2 was immunologically related to, but not identical with avian myeloblastosis virus (AMV). RSV-1 showed no such relationship to AMV. RSV-2 differed further from RSV-1 by its growth properties in cell cultures derived from individual chick embryos. About 40% of the embryos from a commercial line of chickens gave tissue cultures resistant to RSV-2, whereas all embryos tested were sensitive to RSV-1. These differences between RSV-1 and RSV-2 proved to be controlled by two helper viruses, RAV-1 and RAV-2. RAV-1 shared with RSV-1 the antigenic makeup and the ability to grow in all chick embryos tested. RAV-2 was antigenically indistinguishable from RSV-2 and was unable to multiply in the same cells which were selectively resistant to RSV-2. The selective cellular resistance to RSV-2 was probably of genetic origin, since no evidence for the presence of an interfering avian leukosis virus could be found. The same resistance was also effective against the Schmidt-Ruppin strain of RSV and certain preparations of AMV.