TWEAK, a new secreted ligand in the tumor necrosis factor family that weakly induces apoptosis.
The members of the tumor necrosis factor (TNF) family play pivotal roles in the regulation of the immune system. Here we describe a new ligand in this family, designated TWEAK. The mouse and human versions of this protein are unusually conserved with 93% amino acid identity in the receptor binding domain. The protein was efficiently secreted from cells indicating that, like TNF, TWEAK may have the long range effects of a secreted cytokine. TWEAK transcripts were abundant and found in many tissues, suggesting that TWEAK and TRAIL belong to a new group of widely expressed ligands. Like many members of the TNF family, TWEAK was able to induce interleukin-8 synthesis in a number of cell lines. The human adenocarcinoma cell line, HT29, underwent apoptosis in the presence of both TWEAK and interferon-gamma. Thus, TWEAK resembles many other TNF ligands in the capacity to induce cell death; however, the fact that TWEAK-sensitive cells are relatively rare suggests that TWEAK along with lymphotoxins alpha/beta and possibly CD30L trigger death via a weaker, nondeath domain-dependent mechanism.
Chicheportiche
Y
Y
Department of Pathology, University of Geneva, 1211 Geneva 4, Switzerland.
Bourdon
P R
PR
Xu
H
H
Hsu
Y M
YM
Scott
H
H
Hession
C
C
Garcia
I
I
Browning
J L
JL
D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis; D051017:Apoptosis Regulatory Proteins; D001483:Base Sequence; D015152:Blotting, Northern; D002352:Carrier Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D018925:Chemokines / Q000378:metabolism; D002874:Chromosome Mapping; D002886:Chromosomes, Human, Pair 17; D000074049:Cytokine TWEAK; D018076:DNA, Complementary; D006801:Humans; D008024:Ligands; D051379:Mice; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D015398:Signal Transduction; D014407:Tumor Cells, Cultured; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha / Q000378:metabolism*; D048069:Tumor Necrosis Factors
D051017:Apoptosis Regulatory Proteins; D002352:Carrier Proteins; D018925:Chemokines; D000074049:Cytokine TWEAK; D018076:DNA, Complementary; D008024:Ligands; C109743:TNFSF12 protein, human; C491645:Tnfsf12 protein, mouse; D014409:Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha; D048069:Tumor Necrosis Factors