Smooth muscle type isoform of 20 kDa myosin light chain is expressed in monocyte/macrophage cell lineage

Myosin light chain genes of human hematopoietic cells have not been fully characterized. We previously reported the cloning of the full-length cDNAs of 20 kDa regulatory myosin light chain (MLC-2), named as MLC-2A, from Meg-01, a human megakaryoblastic leukemia cell line (J. Smooth Muscle Res. 37: 25-38, 2001). We now cloned another MLC-2 isoforms from human platelets and U937, a human monocytic leukemia cell line, named as MLC-2B and MLC-2C, respectively. Both MLC-2A and MLC-2B consisted of three exons, which were situated on gene loci 18p1.3. Analysis of the gene structure indicated that MLC-2A and MLC-2B utilized different exons. MLC-2C also consisted of three exons, which was situated on gene loci 20p12. Amino acid sequence of MLC-2C was, of interest, apparently almost the same as that of MLC-2 from chicken gizzard smooth muscle LC20-A (one amino acid's difference) and human vascular smooth muscle LC-20 (two amino acids' difference). All three protein kinase C phosphorylation residues (Ser-1, Ser-2, Thr-9) and both myosin light chain kinase phosporylation residues (Thr-18, Ser-19) are conserved in these three isoforms. The MLC-2A and MLC-2B mRNA were expressed constitutively in all of the human hematopoietic cell lines examined and their expression levels were almost the same. On the other hand, MLC-2C mRNA was expressed in untreated monocytic cell lines (U937 and A-THP-1) and HL-60 differentiated into monocyte/macrophage cell lineage by TPA treatment. These results indicate that smooth muscle type isoform, MLC-2C is the inducible isoform, and might play a crucial role in monocyte/macrophage cell lineage.