Involvement of nuclear factor-kappa B in induction of the interleukin-6 gene by leukemia inhibitory factor.

Recent studies have indicated that the leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF) induces secretion of interleukin-6 (IL-6) in myeloid cells. We here show that synthesis of IL-6 by human mononuclear phagocytes exposed to recombinant human (rh) LIF is preceded by an increase of IL-6 transcript levels as a result of transcriptional activation of the IL-6 gene. Analysis of deleted fragments of the IL-6 promoter indicated that transcriptional activation of the IL-6 promoter was associated with enhanced binding activity of the transcription factor nuclear factor (NF)-kappa B. Binding of activation protein (AP)-1 and NF-IL-6, also known to transcriptionally activate the IL-6 promoter, was not inducible by LIF. Furthermore, introduction of the NF-kappa B sequence into a heterologous promoter construct, but not of AP-1- and NF-IL-6-binding sequences, conferred inducibility by LIF to this promoter. Deletion of the NF-kappa B binding site in the IL-6 promoter was associated with loss of inducibility by LIF, lending further support for the notion that the NF-kappa B binding site is crucial for LIF-mediated induction of the IL-6 promoter. Taken together, our results show that rhLIF induces IL-6 gene expression in mononuclear phagocytes through transcriptional gene activation involving NF-kappa B.