Dominant negative mutant of retinoic acid receptor alpha inhibits retinoic acid-induced P19 cell differentiation by binding to DNA.

Retinoic acid (RA) is a potent inducer of P19 cell differentiation. RA activity is thought to be mediated by nuclear RA receptors (RARs), transcription factors whose activity is dependent on RA. There are three RARs called alpha, beta, and gamma. We created truncated versions of the three RARs and compared their activities as inhibitors of RA-mediated gene transcription and of P19 cell differentiation. Only mutants of the RAR alpha were inhibitory in these assays. A mutant of RAR alpha carrying a 10-amino-acid insert was able to heterodimerize with RXRbeta or with the normal RAR alpha and the inhibitory activity of this mutant was dependent on an intact DNA binding domain. We conclude that dominant negative mutants of RAR alpha act by heterodimerizing with RXRs or RARs and binding to RA response elements on DNA, thereby preventing binding of the normal receptors to those sites.