Cell-type-specific synthesis of murine immunoglobulin mu RNA from an adenovirus vector.

The mouse immunoglobulin heavy-chain mu constant region gene was cloned into the early region 1B of an adenovirus type 5 vector to allow reproducible kinetics of expression of the mu gene in the presence of continuous host protein synthesis after infection by the recombinant. The immunoglobulin-adenovirus recombinant is helper independent in infecting human fibroblastic and B- and T-cell lines and expresses mu in a cell-type-specific manner. By Northern blot analysis, correctly polyadenylated and spliced E1B-mu S and E1B-mu m mRNAs are found to be equally abundant at steady state in fibroblasts. In contrast, and appropriately, only E1B-mu S mRNAs accumulate in a lambda light-chain-secreting myeloma cell line. Analysis of nascent transcripts pulse labeled in isolated nuclei demonstrates equimolar polymerase loading throughout the mu region in all cell types infected by mu-Ad. Thus, correct polyadenylation and splicing of E1B-mu S and E1B-mu m in fibroblasts does not require transcription termination in the region separating the mu S and mu m polyadenylation sites. Furthermore, differential expression of mu transcripts in the background of myeloma cells is regulated at the level of RNA processing and does not require the presence of the immunoglobulin heavy-chain enhancer or promoter element.