Possible transforming activity of interferon regulatory factor 2 in tumorigenicity assay of NIH3T3 cells transfected with DNA from chronic myelogenous leukemia patients

Little is known about the transforming gene identified in the genomic DNA of chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) by the tumorigenicity assay. To detect a new transforming gene of CML, we re-investigated the transforming activity of interferon regulatory factor (IRF)-1 and -2 genes in the tumorigenicity assay of NIH3T3 cells transfected with genomic DNA of leukemic cells from 15 patients with CML (12 patients in the chronic phase, one in the blastic phase and two in both phases). We detected the functionally active IRF-2 gene only in the tumor DNA from two CML patients in the blastic phase. We did not detect integration of the IRF-1 gene in the DNA of any tumors derived from the CML patient samples, and also we detected no expression of human IRF-1 mRNA. Thus, NIH3T3 cells may have been transformed due to integration of the functionally active IRF-2 gene from CML patients in the blastic phase. We surmise that there is a possibility that the IRF-2 gene may be involved in the evolution of the blastic phase of CML.