CLONING OF A MITOGEN-INDUCIBLE GENE ENCODING A KAPPA-B DNA-BINDING PROTEIN WITH HOMOLOGY TO THE REL ONCOGENE AND TO CELL-CYCLE MOTIFS

WE have cloned and characterized a mitogen-inducible gene isolated from human T cells that predicts a protein of 968 amino acids. The amino-terminal domain has regions homologous to the oncogene rel and to the developmentally important gene dorsal of Drosophila. The carboxy-terminal domain contains repeat structures found in a variety of proteins that are involved in cell-cycle control of yeast and in tissue differentiation in Drosophila and Ceanorhabditis elegans, as well as in the putative human oncogene bcl-3 and in the ankyrin protein. A truncated form of the product of this gene translated in vitro is a DNA-binding protein which interacts specifically with the KB binding site found in many inducible genes, including the enhancer in human immunodeficiency virus. This gene is yet another in a growing list of important regulatory molecules whose expression is transcrip-tionally induced upon cellular activation. © 1990 Nature Publishing Group.