Retrovirally mediated introduction of a cDNA encoding a placenta-derived low-affinity receptor for human granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) into murine FDC-P1 hemopoietic cells allowed these cells to proliferate when stimulated by human GM-CSF. The expressed human receptors on cloned lines were of low affinity (Kd = 4-6 nM), were internalized, and did not interact with endogenous GM-CSF receptors. Concentrations of human GM-CSF of 6.5-13 nM were required to stimulate 50% maximal colony formation versus a concentration of murine GM-CSF of 6 pM; this difference is comparable with the difference in relative affinities of the human and murine receptors for their respective ligands. If maintained in murine GM-CSF, cells able to bind or respond to human GM-CSF were rapidly lost due to transcriptional inactivation of the inserted cDNA.The observations indicate that low-affinity receptors for human GM-CSF can deliver a proliferative signal in appropriate cells and that the signaling mechanisms are not species-specific.Granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) is a growth factor regulating the proliferation, differentiation, and functional activity of neutrophils, macrophages, and eosinophils (1-3). GM-CSF has also been reported to have proliferative activity for endothelial cells (4), fibroblasts (5), osteoblasts (6), and placental cells (7). On hemopoietic and nonhemopoietic cells, both high-and low-affinity membrane GM-CSF receptors have been described with equilibrium dissociation constants (Kd) of 10-50 pM and 1-5 nM, respectively (8-11). Because most of the biological effects of GM-CSF are observed at picomolar concentrations (1) and high-affinity receptors are preferentially internalized (N.A.N. and L. Peterson, unpublished results), it is not clear whether low-affinity receptors are biologically functional. In the murine system at 37°C (12) and the human system at 4°C or 37°C (11, 13, 14), multipotential CSF (interleukin 3) can down-modulate GM-CSF receptors on some types of hemopoietic cells, but it is not clear whether this is mediated by different receptor subclasses or by receptor-receptor interactions (10,11,13).We have cloned a low-affinity receptor for human GM-CSF (hGM-CSF) from placental cells (Kd of 5 nM) (10). We now show that when this receptor is introduced into a murine GM-CSF (mGM-CSF)-dependent hemopoietic cell line (FDC-P1) by using a retroviral vector, it retains its lowaffinity phenotype but can nevertheless transmit the biological signals required for cell proliferation.
MATERIALS AND METHODSProduction and Selection of hGM-CSF Receptor Retrovirus.A 1.7-kilobase pair Xho I fragment containing the insert cDNA of pGMR29 (10) The stimuli used for colony formation were purified recombinant mGM-CSF (50 units/ml = 12 pM) or purified recombinant hGM-CSF (50 units/ml = 36 pM) produced as nonglycosylated derivatives in Escherichia coli. These were included as 0.1-ml volumes during preparation of the agar Abbreviations: GM-CSF, granulocyte-macrophage colony...