Specific protein kinases modulated during T cell mitogenesis. Activity of a 55-kDa serine kinase is associated with growth arrest in human T cells.

The intracellular events which are involved in controlling the G1 to S phase transition during the eucaryotic cell cycle are important to define in order to understand the mechanisms by which mitogenic and growth arrest-inducing agents control cell growth. Because a change in protein kinase activity is associated with the initial response of cells to mitogenic stimulants and growth factors, we used a kinase renaturation assay to identify specific protein kinases which are modulated as human T cells make the G1 to S phase transition after mitogenic stimulation with lectin. We identified four protein serine/threonine kinases of 180, 97, 85, and 38 kilodaltons which are increased in activity as these cells enter S phase. A-55 kDa serine/threonine kinase (PK55) was shown to have maximal activity during G0 and its activity was reduced by 95% upon movement into S phase. PK55 is inducible in human T cells by removal of interleukin 2 and low serum incubation which arrests cells in G1 phase, indicating that it is closely associated with G1 phase growth arrest. Furthermore, a similar PK55 activity was induced upon growth arrest in HL-60 cells treated with dimethyl sulfoxide and in Daudi cells treated with interferon alpha. Because the cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PK-A) family has been shown to be antiproliferative to lectin stimulated T cells, we were interested in determining whether PK55 was in fact an isozyme of PK-A. Comparative analysis using a specific peptide inhibitor of PK-A activity revealed that PK55 is catalytically distinct from PK-A. This data suggest that increases in PK55 may be associated with the growth-arrested state and further that PK55 is distinct from PK-A.