AN ABNORMAL SPLICE DONOR SITE IN ONE ALLELE OF THE THYROID PEROXIDASE GENE IN FRTL5 RAT-THYROID CELLS INTRODUCES A PREMATURE STOP CODON - ASSOCIATION WITH THE ABSENCE OF FUNCTIONAL ENZYMATIC-ACTIVITY

Low stringency screening of an FRTL5 cDNA library with a human thyroid peroxidase (TPO) cDNA probe yielded two different types of TPO cDNA clones. One type contained the full-length structural gene, but there was an A at the first nucleotide of an intronic splice donor site that leads to alternate splicing, with the retention of part of an intron. This 54-basepair retained intron fragment contains a premature inframe stop codon that would truncate the protein at its carboxyl-terminus by 71% with the loss of enzymatic activity. The second type of TPO cDNA does not contain the retained intron fragment and premature stop codon, but it is not full-length and lacks 580-680 basepairs at its 5′ end. However, Northern blot analysis reveals only full-length copies (3.2 kilobases) of TPO mRNA in FRTL5 cells, and this 5′ truncation is, therefore, an artifact of library construction. The relative proportions of the two types of TPO mRNA in FRTL5 cells was determined by the polymerase chain reaction, using as template single stranded cDNA generated by reverse transcription of FRTL5 mRNA. Slightly more than half of the TPO mRNA in the FRTL5 cells represented the form with the abnormal splice donor site. The relative proportions of the two TPO mRNA forms was not influenced by TSH stimulation of the FRTL5 cells, and the proportion remained unaltered even after the FRTL5 cells were subcloned by limiting dilution. At the genomic level, we used allele-specific oligonucleotides for the mutant and normal forms of TPO, and found FRTL5 cells to have both normal and abnormal TPO alleles. Normal Fischer rat thyroid tissue had only the normal allele for TPO. No TPO enzymatic activity could be detected in FRTL5 cells. In summary, the present study demonstrates a genetic abnormality in at least one allele of the TPO gene in FRTL5 cells that contributes to the lack of TPO enzymatic activity in these cells. © 1990 by The Endocrine Society.