Messenger ribonucleic acid from tumors associated with humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy directs the synthesis of a secretory parathyroid hormone-like peptide.

Previous studies have provided evidence that tumors associated with humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy produce a factor that shares certain biological properties with, but is not, native PTH. In the present study, media from Xenopus oocytes microinjected with polyadenylated RNA prepared from three human or animal tumors associated with humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy are shown to have activity in the cytochemical bioassay for PTH. This activity parallels that of the PTH standard in the assay and is completely inhibited by the PTH analog [Nle8,Nle18,Tyr34]bovine PTH-(3-34)NH2. Media from oocytes injected with mRNA from control tumors contain no such activity. The mRNA encoding this activity in one of the animal tumors has been enriched approximately 10-fold by preparative polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. These results demonstrate that tumors associated with humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy have the capacity for directing the synthesis of a secretory protein that fulfills certain criteria for being the humoral mediator in question. These techniques may provide the basis for molecular cloning of this factor.