Molecular cloning of the coding sequence of an interleukin-2 receptor alpha subunit cDNA in murine brain

Interleukin-2 (IL-2) has various trophic and neuromodulatory actions in the mammalian central nervous system (CNS). The interleukin-2 receptor alpha (IL-2R alpha) is an accessory subunit of the IL-2 receptor heterotrimer complex which is essential for 'high' affinity IL-2 binding. Although an IL-2R alpha (or IL-2R alpha-like) epitope has been localized in brain by immunohistocytochemistry, it was unknown whether the IL-2R alpha subunit expressed in brain was derived from the same or a different gene than the lymphocyte IL-2R alpha. Therefore, in the present study, the cDNA comprising the full length coding region was cloned and sequenced from saline-perfused forebrain. The brain IL-2R alpha cDNA was found to be 100% homologous with the corresponding lymphocyte IL-2R alpha cDNA sequence. IL-2R alpha mRNA was expressed at very low levels in saline-perfused forebrain of non-challenged BALB/c mice as well as in saline-perfused forebrain from severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) mice. The present data, demonstrating IL-2R alpha gene expression in both well-perfused normal and SCID mouse forebrain from which no CD3 gamma gene expression was detected by PCR, provides evidence that the IL-2R alpha clones isolated are from resident brain cells and not from blood lymphocytes (e.g. T lymphocytes). Thus, these findings demonstrate that the protein coding sequence of the mouse brain IL-2R alpha is derived from the same gene coding sequence as the lymphocyte IL-2R alpha, and indicate that previously reported differences in the size of their respective mRNA transcripts appear to be due to differences in untranslated regions.