Stage-specific transforming genes of human and mouse B- and T-lymphocyte neoplasms.

DNAs of 20 B- and T-lymphocyte neoplasms of human and mouse origin induced transformation of NIH/3T3 cells with high efficiencies, indicating that these neoplasms contained activated transforming genes that were detectable by transfection. Analysis of the susceptibility of the transforming activities of lymphocyte-neoplasm DNAs to digestion with restriction endonucleases indicated that the same or closely related transforming genes were activated in independent neoplasms representative of the same stage of normal cell differentiation. However, different transforming genes were activated in neoplasms representative of different stages of normal B- and T-lymphocyte differentiation. These results indicate that specific transforming genes are activated in neoplasms of discrete stages of differentiation within these cell lineages.