Thyroglobulin (Tg) is an essential thyroid-specific protein, which serves as the matrix for thyroid hormone biosynthesis. To obtain new insights in the regulation of Tg gene expression, we investigated the interaction of the human Tg promoter with the thyroid-specific transcription factors TTF-1 and Pax8. A reporter gene, containing a 202 bp fragment from the human Tg 5 -flanking region including the promoter sequence and the transcriptional start site, and expression vectors containing the cDNAs for human TTF-1 and Pax8 were used in cotransfection experiments, in the non-thyroidal cell lines COS-7 and HeLa. Pax8 increased the specific transcriptional activity of the Tg promoter about threefold, whereas cotransfection with the homeodomain-containing protein TTF-1 stimulated promoter activity from six-to tenfold. The simultaneous expression of both factors stimulated the Tg promoter activity in a multiplicative manner up to 25-fold. TTF-1 binding sites could be localized precisely by lectron mobility shift assay. The two binding elements corresponded to sites A and C in the rat Tg promoter. Site-directed mutagenesis of three nucleotides in each binding element inhibited binding of TTF-1 to the two oligonucleotides. In cotransfection experiments, the mutant site C decreased TTF-1 transactivation to 26% of the wild-type, whereas an additional mutation in the site A reduced this value to almost zero, thus proving the physiological relevance of these sites. The present results demonstrate that the activity of the human Tg promoter is closely dependent on the function of TTF-1 and Pax8, opening the field for further investigations of pathological alterations of Tg gene expression.

The regulation of the human Na(+)/I(-) symporter (NIS) gene is of considerable interest for both the diagnosis and therapy of thyroid pathologies. We investigated the influence of the thyroid-specific transcription factors TTF-1 and Pax8 on the NIS promoter and its 5'-flanking sequence. Reporter genes containing the corresponding genomic fragments coupled to a luciferase reporter gene were cotransfected with expression vectors carrying the the cDNA's for TTF-1 and Pax8. Transient transfection assays were performed in HeLa and COS-7 cells, which do not express endogenously these transcription factors. The experiments showed, that TTF-1 had no influence on the NIS promoter. Pax8, on the other hand, had a moderate stimulating effect (threefold) on the proximal NIS promoter. ABCD assays indicated an interaction of in vitro-translated Pax8 with the NIS promoter. However, DNase I footprinting experiments with bacterially expressed Pax8 were negative, suggesting an indirect mode of action with the participation of other proteins. A putative NIS upstream enhancer (NUE) 9000 bp upstream of the NIS gene, which was cloned based on its sequence homology to the rat NUE, was not transactivated by either Pax8 or TTF-1. The present data demonstrate, that the combination of Pax8 and TTF-1 is less important for NIS gene transcription than for other thyroid-specific genes. This is presumably related to the fact, that NIS is expressed also in other tissues such as mammary and salivary gland.