Analysis of the HMGI nuclear proteins in mouse neoplastic cells induced by different procedures

Four malignant tumors induced in mouse by different experimental procedures were compared as regards their high-mobility-group (HMG) proteins. All tumors showed the complete set of three HMG proteins which we call HMGI-C, I-D, and I-E. The presence of the three HMGI proteins is a characteristic of the transformed phenotype regardless of whether the tumor was chemically, virally, or spontaneously derived. However, the level of expression of the HMGI proteins is not constant in the four tumors. Using reverse-phase HPLC, the individual HMGI proteins were isolated from the spontaneously derived tumor (Lewis lung carcinoma) and shown by amino acid analysis to be similar to those previously obtained from a tumor grown in nude mice by inoculation of in vitro-transformed cells.