Deregulated PAX-5 transcription from a translocated IgH promoter in marginal zone lymphoma

The PAX-5 gene codes for the transcription factor BSAP, which is expressed throughout B-cell development. Although loss-of-function mutation in the mouse showed an essential role for Pax-5 in early B lymphopoiesis, gain-of-function mutations have implicated the human PAX-5 gene in the control of late B-cell differentiation. PAX-5 (on 9p13) has been involved together with the immunoglobulin heavy-chain (IgH) gene (on 14q32) in the recurring t(9;14)(p13;q32) translocation that is characteristic of small lymphocytic lymphoma with plasmacytoid differentiation. Here we have characterized a complex t(2;9;14)(p12;p13;q32) translocation present in a closely related non-Hodgkin's lymphoma referred to as splenic marginal zone lymphoma (MZL). In this MZL-1 translocation, the two promoters of PAX-5 were replaced on the derivative chromosome 14 by an immunoglobulin switch Smicro promoter that was linked to the structural PAX-5 gene upstream of its translation initiation codon in exon 1B. Expression analyses confirmed that PAX-5 transcription was upregulated due to efficient initiation at the Smicro promoter in the malignant B lymphocytes of patient MZL-1. For comparison we have analyzed PAX-5 expression in another B-cell lymphoma, KIS-1, indicating that transcription from the distal PAX-5 promoter was increased in this tumor in agreement with the previously characterized translocation of the immunoglobulin Emicro; enhancer adjacent to PAX-5 exon 1A. In both lymphomas, the J-chain gene, which is thought to be under negative control by BSAP, was not expressed, whereas transcription of the putative target gene p53 was unaffected by PAX-5 overexpression. Together these data indicate that the t(9;14)(p13;q32) translocation contributes to lymphoma formation as a regulatory mutation that leads to increased PAX-5 expression in late B-cell differentiation due to promoter replacement or enhancer insertion.