Difference in the Production of Human Interferon-  and -beta in Mouse Cells

Abstract

SUMMARYHuman interferon-at and interferon-fl genes with their flanking regions were introduced into mouse LMTK-cells. Although transfected cells contained the interferon genes with a similar copy number and produced a similar amount of interferon-specific mRNA, cells containing the human interferon-fl gene secreted about 10 times more human interferon than cells transfected with the human interferon-cq gene. When the coding region of the interferon-fl gene was replaced by that of the interferon-at gene (hybrid interferon fl/a gene), the human interferon production of transfected ceils fell by approx, one order of magnitude. These results show that in the case of exogenous interferon genes a translational or post-translational mechanism might significantly affect the final level of human interferons, resulting in higher titres of interferon-fl than of interferon-a.