A myeloid leukemia cell line designated Kasumi-6 was established from the bone marrow cells of an individual with acute myeloid leukemia, subtype M2. Both the original leukemic cells and the Kasumi-6 cell line harbor a hemizygous point mutation in the gene encoding the CCAAT/enhancer binding protein alpha (C/EBPalpha), a critical myeloid transcriptional factor. The C to G transition at nucleotide 1063 of the C/EBPalpha gene results in amino acid transition R305P in the fork or hinge region between the DNA-binding basic region and the leucine zipper dimerization domain of the C/EBPalpha protein. The Kasumi-6 cells expressed both the p42 and p30 isoforms of the C/EBPalpha protein endogenously, but electrophoretic mobility shift assays demonstrated an absence of C/EBPalpha binding to its respective site. Exogenous expression of the mutant form of C/EBPalpha demonstrated that it was unable to bind DNA and activate transcription from a G-CSF receptor-luciferase reporter construct. Furthermore, coexpression of the wild-type and mutant forms revealed that the mutant form repressed reporter gene activation by the wild type in a dose-responsive manner. This was concomitant with a dose-responsive decrease in wild-type protein binding to the G-CSF receptor C/EBP site. The data suggest that the R305P alteration confers a dominant-negative property on the mutant C/EBPalpha protein whereby the mutant polypeptide heterodimerizes with the wild-type polypeptide and prevents it from binding to DNA, thus blocking transcriptional activation. The Kasumi-6 cell line can serve as a model to study the cellular and molecular biology of the non-t(8;21) M2 type of myeloid leukemia and can elucidate the role of mutated C/EBPalpha in leukemogenesis.
Copyright 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc.