期刊名称:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
印刷版ISSN:0027-8424
电子版ISSN:1091-6490
出版年度:1992
卷号:89
期号:17
页码:8215-8219
DOI:10.1073/pnas.89.17.8215
语种:English
出版社:The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
摘要:The human neutrophil and monocyte-derived serine protease homologues neutrophil elastase (NE), proteinase 3 (PR3), and azurocidin (AZU) are involved in a variety of immune defense reactions. NE and PR3 assist in the destruction of phagocytosed microorganisms, cleave the important connective-tissue protein elastin, and generate chemotactic activities by forming alpha 1-proteinase inhibitor complexes and elastin peptides. AZU is cytotoxic to certain microorganisms and chemotactic for monocytes. All three proteins are produced and packaged into azurophil granules in large quantities during neutrophil differentiation. We have isolated several cosmid clones each of which contains the functional genes for AZU, PR3, and NE in this order. The PR3 gene is separated by 8 kilobases from the 3' end of the AZU gene and by 3 kilobases from the 5' end of the NE gene. We report a physical map of the gene cluster, its location on chromosome 19pter, and the exon-intron organization of the AZU and PR3 genes. Our fluorescence in situ hybridization studies disprove the previous chromosomal assignment of the human NE gene to 11q14. The five exons of AZU and PR3 are organized like those of NE and other granule-associated serine proteases of hematopoietic cells. NE, PR3, and AZU are coordinately downregulated in the premonocytic cell line U937 during induced terminal differentiation. The cluster-like physical organization of these genes and concerted regulation during hematopoietic differentiation suggests that they are located in a developmentally activated chromatin domain promoting high-level, cell-specific expression in the monocyte-myelocyte lineage.