Characterization of endogenous human promyelocytic leukemia isoforms

Promyelocytic leukemia (PML) has been implicated in a variety of functions, including control of TP53 function and modulation of cellular senescence. Sumolated PML is the organizer of mature PML bodies, recruiting a variety of proteins onto these nuclear domains. The PML gene is predicted to encode a variety of protein isoforms. Overexpression of only one of them, PML-IV, promotes senescence in human diploid fibroblasts, whereas PML-III was proposed to specifically interact with the centrosome. We show that all PML isoform proteins are expressed in cell lines or primary cells. Unexpectedly, we found that PML-III, PML-IV, and PML-V are quantitatively minor isoforms compared with PML-I/II and could not confirm the centrosomal targeting of PML-III. Stable expression of each isoform, in a pml-null background, yields distinct subcellular localization patterns, suggesting that, like in other RBCC/TRIM proteins, the COOH-terminal domains of PML are involved in interactions with specific cellular components. Only the isoform-specific sequences of PML-I and PML-V are highly conserved between man and mouse. That PML-I contains all conserved exons and is more abundantly expressed than PML-IV suggests that it is a critical contributor to PML function(s).