Three lymphoid-specific factors account for all junctional diversity characteristic of somatic assembly of T-cell receptor and immunoglobulin genes.
Abstract
The somatic diversity immunoglobulin and T-cell receptor diversity is largely provided by the junctional variation created during site-specific rearrangement of separately encoded gene segments. Using a transient transfection assay, we demonstrate that the recombination activating genes Rag1 and Rag2 direct site-specific rearrangement on an artificial substrate in poorly differentiated as well as in differentiated nonlymphoid cell lines. In addition to a high frequency of precise recombination events, coding joints show deletions and more rarely P-nucleotide insertions, reminiscent of immunoglobulin and T-cell receptor junctions found in fetal tissues. N-region insertions, which are characteristic of adult junctional diversity, are obtained at high frequency upon transfection of a terminal deoxynucleotidyltransferase expression vector together with Rag1 and Rag2. These results show that only three lymphoid-specific factors are needed to generate all types of junctional diversity observed during lymphoid development.
- Publication:
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Proceedings of the National Academy of Science
- Pub Date:
- April 1992
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.89.7.2799
- Bibcode:
- 1992PNAS...89.2799K