1. No category

From www.bloodjournal.org by guest on October 21, 2014. For personal use only.
1996 87: 1155-1161
High incidence of potential p53 inactivation in poor outcome
childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia at diagnosis
DI Marks, BW Kurz, MP Link, E Ng, JJ Shuster, SJ Lauer, I Brodsky and DS Haines
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High Incidence of Potential p53 Inactivation in Poor Outcome Childhood
Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia at Diagnosis
By David I. Marks, Benedikt W. Kurz, Michael P. Link, Eliza Ng, Jonathan J. Shuster, Stephen J. Lauer,
lsadore Brodsky, and Dale S. Haines
Previousstudies have indicated that p53 gene mutations
were an uncommon event in acute lymphoblastic leukemia
(ALL) in children. In one series of330 patients, p53mutations
were seen in fewer than 3%. Weanalyzedbone marrow
mononuclear cells derived
from 10 children with ALL at diagnosis who subsequentlyfailed to achieve a complete remission or who developed relapsewithin 6 months of attaining
completeremissionforp53gene
mutations and mdm-2
overexpression. We found that three children had p53 gene
mutations,andfouroverexpressed
mdm-2. Also,experiments comparing relative levels of mdm-2 RNA and protein
in these patients demonstrated that mdm-2 overexpression
can occur at the transcriptional and posttranscriptional
level
in primary leukemic cells. Although we were unable to link
Waf-l RNA expressionwith p53 statusin childhood ALL, our
datashow potential p53 inactivation by multiple mechanisms in a large percentage of these patients and demonstrate that these alterations can be detected at diagnosis.
Inactivationof the p53 pathway may, therefore, be important in childrenwith ALL who fail to respondto treatment
and may be useful for the early identification of children
requiring alternative therapies.
0 1996 by The American Society of Hematology.
T
Overexpression of mdm-2 constitutes a potential alternative mechanism of p53 pathway inactivation,” but its significance has not been determined in pediatric ALL. Mdm2 RNA overexpression is seen in about 20% to30%of
ALL.”.” Mdm-2 RNA overexpression is seen in all pediatric
ALL cell lines where there was a wild type p53 gene present,13 but the significance of mdm-2 overexpression in primary leukemic cells at diagnosis remains unclear.
In this study, we examine p53 gene status and mdm-2
expression in the bone marrow mononuclear cells of 10 children with ALL who failed to achieve complete remission
orwho relapsed shortly after achieving remission (“poor
outcome” ALL). Our goal was to determine whether molecular alterations in the p53 pathway through p53 gene mutations or mdm-2 protein overexpression were a frequent event
inpoor outcome pediatric ALL. We show that there is a
high incidence of potential p53 pathway inactivation in this
group of patients and that the alterations can be detected at
diagnosis. Three patients demonstrated p53 gene mutations,
while four other patients overexpressed mdm-2 protein. In
addition, we describe two patients with mdm-2 protein over-
HE DEVELOPMENT OF effective therapy for acute
lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) in children constitutes
one of the major advances in oncology during the past 25
years. Currently about 70% to 75% of children are cured.
Modern multiple drug induction regimens achieve complete
remissions in 96% to 100% of patients.’ Further improvements in these results may be made by identifying subsets
of patients with resistant disease who require more intensive
therapy including early bone marrow transplantation or more
aggressive induction regimens.’ Clinical markers have been
used to define high, low, and intermediate risk groups. However, these have limitations because some patients with no
adverse clinical or chromosomal markers do not respond to
therapy.
Genetic factors are important in the etiology and outcome
of pediatric ALL. Certain familial genetic disorders predispose to ALL; the incidence is increased in siblings and
monozygotic twins. Chromosomal abnormalities are seen in
90% of cases, and many structural abnormalities appear to
confer a worse prognosis.’ There are a number of molecular
alterations that have been found to correlate with outcome
in childhood ALL. For example, chromosomal translocations
leading to the E2A-PBXl, bcr-ab1 or MLL-AF4 fusion genes
have been associated with a poor
In contrast,
patients overexpressing the myc proto-oncogene via the 8; 14
translocation may have a favorable prognosis with shortterm intensive therapy.6 However, the incidence of each of
these abnormalities is low. Overall, the translocations resulting in bcr-ab1 (3% to 5%), E2A-PBX1 (6%), MLL-AF4
(2%), and myc overexpression (1%) are rare.
Abnormalities of the p53 gene are common in human
cancers and may be of prognostic significance in hematologic malignan~ies.~
The use of p53 as a potential prognostic
marker in childhood ALL appears limited as the incidence
of p53 mutations at diagnosis is low.’ In a large retrospective
study of 330 patients, only eight were found to have p53
gene mutations. Nevertheless, there is a suggestion that p53
mutations may be important in determining the response to
therapy, because four of the eight patients with mutations
died of aggressive disease. p53 mutations are uncommon in
childhood T-cell ALL at diagnosis, but may be more frequently detected at relapse and can be a predictor of subsequent outcome.’
Blood, Vol 87, No 3 (February l), 1996 pp 1155-1161
From the Division of Hematology and Oncology, the Department
of Medicine, Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University, Philadelphia, PA;the Department of Pediatrics, Stanford
University, Stanford, CA; POG Statistical OfJice, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL; and Emory University, Atlanta, CA.
Submitted July 18, 1995; accepted September 14, 1995.
Supported in part by the Institute for Cancer and Blood Diseases
at Hahnemann University and by Grant No. CA-29139 (National
Cancer Institute) to the Pediatric Oncology Group. E.N. was supported by an ASH Summer Medical Student Scholarship award.
D.I.M. and B.W.K. contributed equally to this study.
Address reprint requests to Dale S. Haines, PhD, Division of
Hematology and Oncology, Department of Medicine, Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann Universiry, Broad and Vine,
Philadelphia, PA 19102.
The publication costs of this article were defrayed in part by page
charge payment. This article must therefore be hereby marked
“advertisement’’in accordance with 18 U.S.C. section 1734 solely to
indicate this fact.
0 1996 by The American Society of Hematology.
0006-4971/96/8703-0018$3.00/0
1155
From www.bloodjournal.org by guest on October 21, 2014. For personal use only.
1156
MARKS ET AL
expression who had normal mdm-2 RNA levels, indicating
the importance of measuring protein and not just RNA and
pointing to a novel posttranscriptional mechanism of mdm2 overexpression in primary leukemic cells.
MATERIALS ANDMETHODS
Patients and samples. Patients included in this study were
treated on the Pediatric Oncology Group (POG) ALin C #l5 Studies
for Standard and High Risk Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia, conducted between January 1991 and November 1994. Informed consent
for sample submission was obtained from patients or from their
parents. Bone marrow specimens were routinely obtained from all
patients at diagnosis entered onto these studies and were sent by
overnight courier to the St Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Mononuclear cells from these bone marrow specimens were separated by
Ficoll-Hypaque (Pharmacia, Piscataway, NJ) density gradient sedimentation, washed in phosphate-buffered saline, resuspended in 70%
RPMI/20% fetal calf semm/lO% dimethyl sulfoxide, and cryopreserved in liquid nitrogen. We identified children on these studies
who failed to achieve complete remission or who achieved complete
remission, but developed relapse within 6 months of diagnosis and
had cryopreserved cells available for study. Cryopreserved cells from
these patients were sent by overnight courier in dry ice and were
immediately thawed and processed. Lymphocytes from normal donors (obtained with informed consent) were also prepared by FicollHypaque density gradient sedimentation and were stored as described above.
Cytogenetic andfluorescent in situ hybridization analysis. Standard cytogenetic techniques were employed and at least 20 metaphases were examined on each patient where possible. Single color
metaphase fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) was performed
using a mixture of digoxigenin labelled p53 cosmid and labelled 17alpha satellite probes (Oncor, Gaithersburg, MD). Hybridization,
posthybridization washes, and detection with fluorescein isothiocyanate labelled antidigoxigenin antibody were performed according to
the manufacturer’s recommended conditions.
DNA extraction, polymerase chain reaction single strand conformational polymorphism analysis and DNA sequencing. High molecular weight DNA was purified from ethanol after a proteinase K
digestion and a phenol-chloroform extraction.I4 Polymerase chain
reactions (PCR) were performed with p53 amplimer primers (exons
4-9, Clontech, Palo Alto, CA) using the manufacturer’s recommended conditions. Labelled PCR products were then denatured,
chilled on ice, and immediately loaded onto two gel systems to
maximize the potential for observing mobility shifts.15These were
a 6% polyacrylamide/0.5~TBE gel containing 5% glycerol’‘ and a
mutation detection enhancement gel with 0.6X TBE (HydrolinkMDE, AT Biochem, Malvern, PA). Products were electrophoresed
at 25 W for 5 hours (or at 10 W for 14 hours for MDE gels) at room
temperature, dried under vacuum, and subjected to autoradiography.
Aberrant migrating bands were excised from dried gels, resuspended
in water, boiled for 15 minutes, and reamplified with appropriate
primer combinations. PCR products were then subcloned into PCRIII
(Invitrogen, San Diego, CA). DNA from clones containing inserts
was pooled and sequenced with a Sequenase I1 kit from US Biochemicals (Cleveland, OH) using the p53 amplimer primers.
Northern analysis. RNA was isolated using RNAzol-B (Biotecx,
Houston, TX), and approximately 10 pg of total cellular RNA was
blotted onto Hybond N’ membrane (Amersham, Arlington Heights,
IL) after separation on 1% formaldehyde-agarose gels.17 Blots were
then hybridized with a random hexamer 32P-labelledmdm-2 probe”
or Waf-l probe (a kind gift from W. El-Dheiry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA) in Rapidhyb buffer (Amersham) as per
the manufacturer’s instructions. Blots were subsequently washed
once at roomtemperature with 2X SSC/O.l% sodium dodecyl sulfate
(SDS) and thentwice with 0.2X SSC/0. I % SDS at 65°C. Densitometrywas performed with RFLP-scan software (Scanalytics, Laurel,
MD), and relative overexpression of mdm-2 and Waf-l were determined after standardization with 18s RNA.
Western analysis. Western blot analysis with 100 pg of total
cellular protein was performed with monoclonal antibodies to mdm2 (IF2, Oncogene Sciences, San Diego, CA), p53 (DO-l, Oncogene
Sciences) and actin (Amersham) as described previously.” Verification of loading was also evaluated after transfer using Ponceau S
(Sigma, St Louis, MO).
RESULTS
Patient characteristics, therapy, and survival. The major
clinical and prognostic findings in the 10 patients treated on
one of two POG protocols (900518 and 9006”) are summarized in Table 1. All individuals responded poorly to therapy
and had short event-free survivals (median 39 days). Nine
of 10 patients had at least one adverse prognostic feature.
The majority were male, and five of 10 were younger than
2 or older than 10 years. Eight of 10 had a white cell count
exceeding 50 X lo9& and four had extramedullary disease.
Cytogenetic abnormalities were seen in 70%, but only one
patient had involvement of chromosome 17. Two patients
had a t(4;ll) and one had an atypical t(9;22); none had a
t( 1;19) rearrangement.
P53 gene status. Single strand conformational polymorphism (SSCP) has been used extensively to detect mutations
within the p53 gene and has been shown to be >90% effective when analyzing PCR products between 100 and 300 bp
long (reviewed in reference 20). We, therefore, employed
this type of analysis to identify if any ofthe 10 poor outcome
patients possessed mutations within the “hot spot” regions
(exons 4 to 9) of p53 at diagnosis. Three patients (1, 6, and
10) had mobility shifts involving exons 8, 6, and 5 respectively (Fig 1). Patients 6 and 10 appeared to possess wild
type alleles in the analyzed cell population, while patient 1
had only mutant p53 alleles. DNA sequencing showed that
patient 1 had a pro,arg insertion at AA282. This is within a
“hot spot” region of p53 and is inan evolutionarily conserved domain, which is one of the most frequent sites of
missense mutations. The second (patient 6) hadan asp to
gly substitution at AA207, which is not in an evolutionarily
conserved site, but is close to a region of p53 that is recognized by a mutant conformation specific p53 monoclonal
antibody.’” It is noteworthy that this patient, who did not
respond to induction chemotherapy and developed progressive disease at 22 days, had no adverse clinical prognostic
factors. The only patient (number 10) to have loss of heterozygosity for the p53 gene by karyotype analysis (Table 1)
had a single nucleotide deletion (-C) at codon 179 resulting
in a frameshift mutation. Karyotype analysis, but not SSCP,
suggested loss of the other functional allele in malignant
cells from patient 10. FISH analysis was performed to determine the p53 gene status in the malignant cell population
from this patient (Fig 2) and demonstrated that this patient
had two populations of cells. Approximately 50% of metaphases examined contained two chromosome 17s and two
Y.+5
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ALL
p53
IN CHILDHOOD
Table 1. Initial Characteristics, Prognostic Features and Outcome of Childhood ALL Patients
Patient
No.
Age
lyr)
1
8
WCC
(x109/L)
783
R
Karyotype.
46,XY,+X,der(4)t(4;11)(11;22)~q21;q23q25;qll), CR
mdm-2
Waf-l
p53 Gene Status
Overexpression
Levelst
-
4.0
253
LOH and Pro, Arg
insertion at codon
282
Wt
mdm-2 protein
5.0
EMD
EFS
(dl
S
84
L, S
der(ll)t(4;11)(11;22)(q21;q23q25;qll),inv(l6)
(q21q23),-22
2172
46,XY,add(9)(p21)[51/47,XY,+lO[4l/46,XY[lll PR
17
CNS
254
15
3
2
205
4
1
18
6
5
6
5
NR
7
7
3
103
8
9
10
15
61
46,XY
10
95
259
52,XY,+X,+Y,+de1(13)(q12q21)x2,+21,+21
CR
-
169
Wt
mdm-2 protein
and RNA
4.0
46,XX,de1(7)(q31)
NR
-
36
27
Wt
Wt
mdm-2 protein
mdm-2 protein
and RNA
26.3
22.0
-
22
-
35.7
CR
L
173
Asp Gly at codon
207
Wt
-
2.0
NR
NR
NR
-
-
33.0
117.0
60.0
46,XX
45,XY,t(3;13;9)(p21;q34;p22),t(4;1l)(q21;q23),
der(6)t(6;12)(q25;q13),dic(12;12)(q13;p11)
46,XY
44,XY,de1(12)(pll),der(l7)t(17;22)(pll;ql1),
add(l9)~p13),-21,-22[111/44,XY,
N
-
22 Wt
41 Wt
25LOH
and frame-shift
at codon 179
-
-
der~9)t(9;22)(p21;qll),del(l2)(pl1),-17,
+add(l9)(p13),-21,-22[41/46,XY~51
Abbreviations: WCC, white cell count; R, response; CR. complete response; PR, partial response; NR, no response;EMD, extramedullary
disease; S, spleen; L, liver; CNS, central nervous system; N. Nodes; EFS, event free survival; Wt. wild-type; LOH, loss of heterozygosity.
Patients 2 and 10 possessed multiple malignant clones in the analyzed population.
t The relative levels of Waf-l RNA for each patient were determined by densitometric analysis after normalization for loading differences
with 18s RNA.
p53 alleles, while the remaining metaphases had only one
p53 gene copy. Therefore, it is likely that patients 1 and IO
have loss of p53 function via loss of heterozygosity and p53
gene mutations in a significant percentage of malignant cells.
However, because patient 6 has retained one wild type p53
allele and does nothave a mutation in an evolutionarily
conserved domain of p53, it remains uncertain if p53 is
inactivated in this individual.
Mdm-2 status. Similar to p53 gene mutations, overexpression of the mdm-2 oncogene has the potential to inhibit
the tumor suppressing function of p53 (reviewed in reference
N
Z
1
SSCP
EXON 8
N 5 6
SSCP
EXON 6
N 10
21
MDE
EXON 5
Fig 1. SSCP analysis of patients 1. 6, and 10. Patient 1 has a
homozygous mobility shift (no normal bandseen), while patients 6
and l 0 appear heterozygous for the p53 gene because normal lunshifted) bands are also present.
IO). Mdm-2 RNA overexpression appears to be common in
hematological malignancies and has been found in 20% to
50% of cases of AML and ALL."." Figure 3 shows a Northem blot of the IO pediatric ALL patients using RNA from
samples obtained at diagnosis. Of I O patients analyzed by
northern blots, two overexpressed mdm-2 RNA more than
IO-fold compared withbonemarrow cells from a normal
donor.
Recentwork in choriocarcinoma celllines"and in primary leukemic cells from Sezary syndrome patients''
showedthatmdm-2 proteins can be overexpressed in the
absence of increased levels of mdm-2 transcripts. This underscores the need to analyze relative levels of mdm-2 proteins
to fully evaluate mdm-2 overexpression in human cancers.
Similar to control bone marrow cells, mdm-2 protein was
barely detectable or not detectable in six of I O patients.
However, four poor outcome patients had cells with elevated
levels of mdm-2 protein (Fig 4). Interestingly, two of these
four patients had normal levels of mdm-2 RNA. Also, multiple mechanisms of overexpression may play a role in patients
with elevated levels of mdm-2 RNA as the extent of mdm2 protein overexpression was much greater than the extent
of mdm-2 RNA overexpression. Allof the patientswith
mdm-2 protein overexpression had wild type p53 genes, but
only four of the seven patients with wild type p53 had mdm2 overexpression.
Meas~rrement of Wqf-1 RNA levels. It isnotcertain
which p53 gene mutations or what degree of mdm-2 overexpression is necessary to cause p53 pathway inactivation in
vivo. Waf-I is a gene thatis transcriptionally upregulated
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MARKS ET AL
1158
B
A
Fig2.FISHanalysis
of metaphases from patient 10. Single color metaphase FISH was performed using a combination of digoxigenin
labelled p53 cosmid and labelled 17-alphasatellite probes. Chromosomes were identified by PI staining (not shown). (AI shows centromeric
and p53 signals on the t w o normal chromosome 17s. (B), which is of a karyotype of monosomy 17, shows only one set of centromeric and
p53 signals. Patient 10 possessed >95% blastsin the marrow at diagnosis. Because approximately 50% ofthe analyzed metaphases had one
set of signals, it is likely that a large percentage of malignant cells from this individual has one copy ofthe p53 gene.
by wild type and not mutant p53 (reviewed in reference 22).
For these reasons we chose to analyze Waf-l RNA as a
potential downstream marker of p53 pathway activity in primary leukemic cells. Normal bone marrow had relatively
low levels of Waf-l RNA (Fig 5). There was a wide range
in Waf-l RNA levels in the 10 samples. Patient 1, who has
a p53 mutation, had low Waf-l RNA levels, but patients 6
and 10, who also have p53 mutations, had relatively high
levels. Overall, in a small group of patients, there was no
significant difference in Waf-l RNA levels between the patients with p53 or mdm-2 abnormalities and those without.
DISCUSSION
The p53 pathway is potentially affected by p53 gene mutation or mdm-2 overexpression in a wide variety of human
cancers. The presence of p53 mutations appears to confer a
worse prognosis in some20*23-25
but not all types of solid
tumorsF6 Similar to solid tumors, the significance of p53
mutations in hematologic malignancies depends on the precise diagnosis. For example, in a large retrospective study
of acute myeloid leukemia, myelodysplastic syndrome, and
chronic lymphocytic leukemia, p53 mutations were found to
correlate with low complete remission rates and poor survival? However, the presence of p53 mutations did not confer a worse prognosis in Burkitt's lymphoma." Although
mdm-2 overexpression has been associated with poor prognostic features in small series of patients with diverse hematologic malignancies,".'2 the overall significance of mdm-2
overexpression in leukemia is uncertain.
With the exception of L3
abnormalities of the
p53 pathway appear to be uncommon in pediatric ALL:
occurring in less than 3% of all patients. This finding seems
to suggest that abnormalities of the p53 pathway are unlikely
to be a significant prognostic factor in this disease. Alternatively, p53 may be important prognostically, but inactivation
may occur through mechanisms other than p53 gene mutation. This study of 10 poor outcome children with ALL
demonstrates that p53 inactivation may be a consistent and
common molecular abnormality at diagnosis in pediatric
ALL patients who fail to enter complete remission or relapse
soon after achieving remission. Abnormalities of the p53
pathway through p53 gene mutations (three patients) or
mdm-2 overexpression (four patients) were seen in seven of
10 individuals. It is likely that these alterations may be restricted to poor outcome patients. This is based on studies
by others demonstrating that p53 gene mutations are rare in
unselected cases of pediatric ALL: but are much more common in samples taken from patients at the time of relapse?
Also, in an initial screen of 25 good outcome patients, we
were unable to identify any patients who overexpressed
mdm-2 (Marks, Kurz and Haines, unpublished data). Confirmation that p53 pathway alterations are important in the
response of this disease to chemotherapy will require a study
that compares poor outcome ALL to a group of good outcome patients who respond well to therapy and remain in
long-term continuous remission.
It is becoming apparent that p53 mutations may have variable effects on cellular proliferation." Some p53 mutants
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1159
p53 INACTIVATION IN CHILDHOODALL
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
1
0
N
Fig 5. Waf-l Northern analysis, using RNA isolated from bone
marrow lymphocytes of10 children with poor outcomeALL at diagFig 3. Mdm-2 Northern analysis, using RNA isolated from bone
nosis and from the marrow of
one normal donor(NI, was performed
marrow lymphocytes of 10 children with poor outcomeALL at diagas described in Materials and Methods. The relative levels of Waf-l
nosis and from the marrow one
of normal donor(NI, was performed
RNA, Waf-l (NI, for each patient were determined by densitometric
as described in Materials and Methods. The relative levels of mdm2 RNA, mdm-Z(N), for each patient were determined by densitometricanalysis after normalization for loadingdifferences with 18s RNA.
analysis after normalization for loadingdifferences with 18s RNA.
tients to determine if this type of analysis will prove to be
a valid way of assessing p53 function in primary tumor cells.
In keeping with previous studies of cell lines derived from
pediatric ALL patients,” all individuals with mdm-2 overexpressionhadwild
type p53 alleles. Also, the same study
showed that all lines that had wild type alleles overexpressed
mdm-2. We were unable to demonstrate either mdm-2 RNA
or protein overexpression in three patients with wild type
p53 alleles. It is, therefore, unlikelythatmdm-2
overexpression in leukemic cells with wild type p53 is simply due
to the increased proliferative potential of these cells in vivo.
This study also shows thatmdm-2 overexpression can
occur in the absence of increased mdm-2 RNA in primary
leukemic cells. Two patients had elevated levels ofboth
mdm-2 RNA andmdm-2 protein, whiletwo patients had
only elevated levels of mdm-2 protein. This finding emphasizes the importance of measuring mdm-2 protein and not
only mdm-2 RNA when evaluating the incidence of mdm2 overexpression in hematological malignancies. It also demonstrates that mdm-2 overexpression can occur at both transcriptional and posttranscriptional levels. It is supported by
our data showing that the relative levels of mdm-2 protein
may have dominant negative activity,.“’..”while for other
mutations, complete p53 pathway inactivation may require
alteration of both alleles.” Two of the patients demonstrated
both loss of heterozygosity for p53 and a p53 gene mutation,
while one patientwith a p53 mutation appeared to have
retained one wild-type allele. It is possible that the p53 pathway is functional in this last individual. Another major uncertainty when assessing p53 pathway function is what degree of mdm-2 overexpression is necessary to inhibit p53
activity. These observations highlight the importance of assessing p53 pathway function in vivo. It may be possible to
use downstream transcriptional targets of p53 as a method
of assessing p53 function. Unfortunately, our data show no
statistically significant difference between the levels of Waf1 RNA (a gene that is upregulated by wild type and not
mutant p53) in individuals with p53 pathway abnormalities
compared with those with wild type p53 alleles and normal
mdm-2 levels. This was not a surprising finding as other
investigators have shown that Waf-l maybe regulated by
p53 independent mechanisms in leukemic celk3”Other p53
transcriptional
need
beto
analyzed in these pa-
1
2
NI)
18.5
102
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 1 0
ND
ND
N
H
J
I ’
1.0 14.0
NI)
0.5
ND
1.0 11.0
1
Fig 4. Western analysis for mdm-2 protein. A total of 100 p g of total cellular protein from the bone marrow of 10 children with poor
outcome ALL was separated on 7.5% SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE), blotted ontonitrocellulose, and probed with a mdm-2
(top panel) or actin (bottompanel) monoclonal antibody. The three right lanes contain protein from normal
bone marrow (NI, H1299 cells (HI,
and JEG cells (J), respectively. JEG cells overexpress mdm-2 protein compared with the H1299 line in the absence of increased m d m t RNA
levels.” High levels of mdm-2 protein were observed only in patients 2, 3, 4, and 5, while no mdm-2 protein was detected in the normal
control or patients 1, 6, 7, 8, or 9. Low levels of mdm-2 protein wereobserved for patient 10. The number presented represents the relative
intensity of the mdm-2 band. The apparent band for patient 7 represents a blotting error; no mdm-2 protein was detectable on repeated
experiments.
From www.bloodjournal.org by guest on October 21, 2014. For personal use only.
1160
MARKS ET AL
overexpression is greater than the relative levels of mdm-2
RNA overexpressioninpatients
with increasedmdm-2
RNA. Recent work has proposedthat the posttranscriptional
mechanism of enhanced translation can cause mdm-2 overexpression in a human choriocarcinoma cell line.” Studies
measuring translation efficiency of mdm-2 RNA and mdm2 protein stabilityare currently being performed to determine
the mechanism of mdm-2 overexpression in leukemic cells.
We have
recently
documentedmdm-2
protein overexpression in the absence of mdm-2 RNA overexpression in
Sezary syndrome.” These mechanistic studies will be important for elucidating the regulation of mdm-2 expression
innormal lymphocytes and fordeterminingthecause
of
altered expression in leukemia.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We would like to thank Dr Mark Boyd for his criticisms of the
manuscript. We are grateful to Dons Morgan for preparing metaphases from the marrow cells and to Abby Sukman for performing
the FISH analyses. We would also like to thank Wafik El-Deiry for
providing the Waf-l probe.
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