Neurite extension and protein tyrosine phosphorylation elicited by inducible expression of the v-src oncogene in a PC12 cell line

Tyrosine-specific protein kinase activity in neuronal differentiation was studied in a PC12 pheochromocytoma cell line (PC12-B9) produced by stable transfection with an inducible v-src gene encoding an activated tyrosine kinase (pp60v-src) under the transcriptional control of the mouse metallothionine I gene promoter. Induction of pp60v-src expression with Cd2+ and Zn2+ resulted in the reversible differentiation of PC12-B9 cells into neuron-like cells. pp60v-src elicited morphological differentiation with apparent first order kinetics at the same rate as NGF-directed neurite outgrowth in PC12-B9 cells. v-src gene expression enhanced the rate of NGF-directed neurite extension in an additive manner. Induction of pp60v-src alone constitutively increased the levels of phosphotyrosine-modified proteins (130-120, 90, 83, 65, 60/59, 36 kDa) detected by immunoblotting with phosphotyrosine antibodies. NGF treatment of PC12-B9 cells transiently increased the levels of distinct phosphotyrosine-modified proteins (108, 46, 42 kDa), as well as common substrates, including a 59-kDa protein that comigrated with alpha-tubulin. Phosphotyrosine-modified proteins were not synergistically increased in PC12-B9 cells induced for both v-src and NGF. The nonsynergistic effects of v-src gene expression on neurite outgrowth and phosphorylation suggest that pp60v-src induces PC12 cell differentiation by an intracellular signaling pathway that is largely distinct from that induced by NGF.