The RhoA transcriptional program in pre-T cells

: Mullin M, Lightfoot K, Clarke R, Miller M, Lahesmaa R, Cantrell D

Publisher: ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

: 2007

: FEBS Letters

: FEBS LETTERS

: FEBS LETT

: 581

: 22

: 4309

: 4317

: 9

: 0014-5793

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.febslet.2007.07.077

The GTPase RhoA is essential for the development of pre-T cells in the thymus. To investigate the mechanisms used by RhoA to control thymocyte development we have used Affymetrix gene profiling to identify RhoA regulated genes in T cell progenitors. The data show that RhoA plays a specific and essential role in pre-T cells because it is required for the expression of transcription factors of the Egr-1 and AP-1 families that have critical functions in thymocyte development. Loss of RhoA function in T cell progenitors causes a developmental block that pheno-copies the consequence of losing pre-TCR expression in Recombinase gene 2 (Rag2) null mice. Transcriptional profiling reveals both common and unique gene targets for RhoA and the pre-TCR indicating that RhoA participates in the pre-TCR induced transcriptional program but also mediates pre-TCR independent gene transcription. (c) 2007 Federation of European Biochemical Societies. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.