Molecular cloning of human CREB-2: an ATF/CREB transcription factor that can negatively regulate transcription from the cAMP response element.

The cAMP response element (CRE) is an octanucleotide motif (TGACGTCA) that mediates diverse transcriptional regulatory effects. In this report we describe the isolation and characterization of a full-length cDNA that encodes a CRE binding protein called CREB-2. Like other ATF/CREB transcription factors, the 351-amino acid CREB-2 protein contains a COOH-terminal leucine-zipper motif and an adjacent basic domain. CREB-2 mRNA is expressed ubiquitously in human tumor cell lines and mouse organs suggesting that it is involved in regulating transcription in a wide variety of cell types. Overexpression of CREB-2 resulted in a consistent and significant repression of CRE-dependent transcription in CV-1 cells. Deletional analyses localized the transcriptional repressor activity of CREB-2 to a 102-amino acid COOH-terminal region (amino acids 249-351) that contains the leucine-zipper and basic domains of the molecule. These results demonstrate that CRE-dependent transcription can be both positively and negatively regulated by structurally related members of the ATF/CREB family.

The first intron of the 4F2 heavy-chain gene contains a transcriptional enhancer element that binds multiple nuclear proteins.

We utilized the human 4F2 heavy-chain (4F2HC) gene as a model system to study the regulation of inducible gene expression during normal human T-cell activation. Previous studies have demonstrated that 4F2HC gene expression is induced during normal T-cell activation and that the activity of the gene is regulated, at least in part, by the interaction of a constitutively active 5'-flanking housekeeping promoter and a phorbol ester-responsive transcriptional attenuator element located in the exon 1-intron 1 region of the gene. We now report that 4F2HC intron 1 contains a transcriptional enhancer element which is active on a number of heterologous promoters in a variety of murine and human cells. This enhancer element has been mapped to a 187-base-pair RsaI-AluI fragment from 4F2HC intron 1. DNase I footprinting and gel mobility shift analyses demonstrated that this fragment contains two nuclear protein-binding sites (NF-4FA and NF-4FB) which flank a consensus binding site for the inducible AP-1 transcription factor. Deletion analysis showed that the NF-4FA, NF-4FB, and AP-1 sequences are each necessary for full enhancer activity. Murine 4F2HC intron 1 displayed enhancer activity similar to that of its human counterpart. Comparison of the sequences of human and murine 4F2HC intron 1s demonstrated that the NF-4FA, NF-4FB, and AP-1 sequence motifs have been highly conserved during mammalian evolution.

Susceptibility to natural killer cell-mediated cytolysis is independent of the level of target cell class I HLA expression.

To test the hypothesis that susceptibility to NK cell-mediated cytolysis varies inversely with the levels of target cell class I HLA expression, NK-susceptible K562 and MOLT-4 target cells have been transfected via electroporation with cloned human class I HLA-A2 and HLA-B7 genes. Stably transfected cells expressing varying levels of cell-surface class I HLA have been selected by fluorescent activated cell sorting and tested for susceptibility to NK-mediated cytolysis by freshly isolated peripheral blood NK cells from nine normal volunteers as well as by cloned human NK effectors and tumor cells from a patient with an NK cell lymphoproliferative disorder. Expression of class I HLA did not alter the susceptibility of K562 or MOLT-4 target cells to NK-mediated cytolysis by any of the effectors tested. In addition, the class I HLA-expressing transfectant cells were identical to mock transfected cells in their ability to compete for lysis in cold target inhibition assays. Treatment of both mock-transfected and class I HLA-transfected K562 cells with IFN-gamma resulted in decreased susceptibility to NK-mediated cytolysis which was independent of the total level of class I HLA expression. These results demonstrate that the level of target cell class I HLA expression is not sufficient to determine susceptibility or resistance to NK-mediated cytolysis of the classical NK targets K562 and MOLT-4.

Structure, expression and regulation of the murine 4F2 heavy chain.

The murine 4F2 molecule is a 125 kilodalton disulfide-linked heterodimeric cell-surface glycoprotein which has been shown to be involved in the processes of cellular activation and proliferation (1). To elucidate the structure, expression, and regulation of the 4F2 molecule, a murine 4F2 heavy chain (4F2HC) cDNA has been isolated and structurally characterized. The murine 4F2HC is a 526 amino acid (aa) type II membrane glycoprotein which is composed of a 75 aa N-terminal intracytoplasmic region, a single hydrophobic putative transmembrane domain, and a 428 aa C-terminal extracellular domain. Comparison with the human 4F2HC cDNA reveals the highest degree of sequence identity within the transmembrane and intracytoplasmic domains. Northern blot analyses have demonstrated that the 4F2HC gene is expressed at relatively high levels in adult testis, lung, brain, kidney, and spleen, and at significantly lower levels in adult liver and cardiac and skeletal muscle. Studies designed to elucidate the pattern of regulation of the murine 4F2HC gene have demonstrated that it is induced during the process of cell activation, but is subsequently expressed at constant levels throughout the cell cycle in exponentially growing cells.

Isolation and structural characterization of the human 4F2 heavy-chain gene, an inducible gene involved in T-lymphocyte activation.

The human 4F2 cell surface antigen is a 120-kilodalton (kDa) disulfide-linked heterodimer which is composed of an 80- to 90-kDa glycosylated heavy chain (4F2HC) and a 35- to 40-kDa nonglycosylated light chain (4F2LC). 4F2 belongs to a family of inducible cell surface molecules which are involved in T-lymphocyte activation and growth. To better understand the molecular mechanism(s) that controls 4F2HC gene expression in both resting and activated T cells, a 4F2HC human genomic clone was isolated and structurally characterized. The 4F2HC gene spans 8 kilobases of chromosome 11 and is composed of nine exons. The 5' upstream region of the gene displays several properties which are characteristic of housekeeping genes. It is G+C rich and hypomethylated in peripheral blood lymphocyte DNA and contains multiple binding sites for the Sp1 transcription factor while lacking TATA or CCAAT sequences. This region of the gene also displays sequence homologies with several other inducible T-cell genes, including the interleukin-2, interleukin-2 receptor alpha chain, dihydrofolate reductase, thymidine kinase, and transferrin receptor genes. A 255-base-pair fragment of the 4F2HC gene which contains 154 base pairs of the 5' flanking sequence was able to efficiently promote expression of the bacterial chloramphenicol acetyltransferase gene in human Jurkat T cells, indicating that it contains promoter or enhancer (or both) sequences. Analyses of chromatin structure in resting and lectin-activated T cells revealed the presence of stable DNase I-hypersensitive sites within both the 5' flanking and intron 1 regions of the 4F2HC gene. Although the 4F2HC gene displayed many of the structural features characteristic of a constitutively expressed gene, lectin-mediated activation of resting peripheral blood T lymphocytes resulted in a dramatic increase in steady-state levels of 4F2HC mRNA.

Relationships between extracellular pH, intracellular pH, and gene expression in Dictyostelium discoideum.

A variety of studies have shown that differentiation of Dictyostelium discoideum amoebae in the presence of cAMP is strongly influenced by extracellular pH and various other treatments thought to act by modifying intracellular pH. Thus conditions expected to lower intracellular pH markedly enhance stalk cell formation, while treatments with the opposite effect favor spores. To directly test the idea that intracellular pH is a cell-type-specific messenger in Dictyostelium, we have measured intracellular pH in cells exposed to either low extracellular pH plus weak acid or high extracellular pH plus weak base using 31P nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). Our results show that there is no significant difference in intracellular pH (cytosolic or mitochondrial) between pH conditions which strongly promote either stalk cell or spore formation, respectively. We have also examined the effects of external pH on the expression of various cell-type-specific markers, particularly mRNAs. Some mRNAs, such as those of the prestalk II (PL1 and 2H6) and prespore II (D19, 2H3) categories, are strongly regulated by external pH in a manner consistent with their cell-type specificity during normal development. Other markers such as mRNAs D14 (prestalk I), D18 (prespore I), 10C3 (common), or the enzyme UDP-galactose polysaccharide transferase are regulated only weakly or not at all by external pH. In sum, our results show that modulation of phenotype by extracellular pH in cell monolayers incubated with cAMP does not precisely mimic the regulation of stalk and spore pathways during normal development and that this phenotypic regulation by extracellular pH does not involve changes in intracellular pH.