Functional Analysis of the Heptasequence SPTSPTY in the Transcriptional Activation Domain of Rat Nuclear Factor 1-A

Nuclear Factor 1 (NF1) proteins are a family of transcriptional factors consisting of four different types: NF1-A, -B, -C, and -X. Some NF1 transcription factors contain a heptasequence motif, SPTSPSY, which is found as a repeat sequence in the carboxy terminal domain (CTD) of the largest subunit of RNA polymerase II. A similar heptasequence, SPTSPTY, is contained in rat liver NF1-A at a position between residues 469 and 475. In order to investigate the roles of the individual amino acids of the heptasequence of rat liver NF1-A in transcriptional activation, we systematically substituted single and multiple amino acid residues with alanine residue(s) and evaluated the transcriptional activities of the mutated NF1-A. Substitution of a single amino acid reduced transcriptional activity by 10 to 30%, except for the proline residue at position 473, whose substitution with alanine did not affect transcriptional activity. However, changes of all four serine and threonine residues to alanine or of the tyrosine residue along with the serine residue at position 469 to alanine reduced the activity to almost background levels. Our results indicate that multiple serine and threonine residues, rather than a single residue, may be involved in the modulation of the transcriptional activities of the factor. Involvement of the tyrosine residue is also implicated.