Nonhuman adenoviruses, including those of the genus Atadenovirus, have the potential to serve as vectors for vaccine and gene therapy applications in humans, since they are resistant to preexisting immunity induced by human adenoviruses in the majority of the population. In this study, we elucidate the outcome of infection by ovine adenovirus type 7 isolate 287 (OAdV) of several nonovine cell types. We show here that OAdV infects a wide range of nonovine cells but is unable to complete its replication cycle in any of them. In nonovine, nonfibroblast cells, viral replication is blocked at an early stage before the onset of, or early in, DNA replication. Some fibroblasts, on the other hand, allow viral DNA replication but block virus production at a later stage during or after the translation of late viral proteins. Late viral proteins are expressed in cells where viral DNA replication takes place, albeit at a reduced level. Significantly, late proteins are not properly processed, and their cellular distribution differs from that observed in infected ovine cells. Thus, our results clearly show that OAdV infection of all nonovine cells tested is abortive even if significant viral DNA replication occurs. These findings have significant positive implications with respect to the safety of the vector system and its future use in humans.Human adenoviruses have been widely studied over the last 4 decades, and the processes involved in infection and replication have been largely characterized. Abortive infection by human adenoviruses has been investigated in human and several nonhuman cell culture systems (reviewed in reference 35). These studies have provided a better understanding of the molecular biology of human adenoviruses and of events such as the integration of foreign DNA into mammalian genomes and the initiation of malignant transformation by DNA tumor viruses. However, the biology of human adenovirus infection in heterologous cells differs widely for various genotypes, even in the same cell line. For example, baby hamster kidney cells (BHK-21) are semipermissive for adenovirus type 2 (Ad2) and Ad5 replication but block infection with Ad3 and Ad12 at an early step of the viral life cycle (13). The early block in Ad12 replication can be abrogated by constitutive expression of E1 genes from Ad2, -