Interleukin-7 signaling in human B cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia cells and murine BAF3 cells involves activation of STAT1 and STAT5 mediated via the interleukin-7 receptor alpha chain.

Interleukin-7 (IL-7) stimulates the proliferation of normal and leukemic B and T cell precursors and T lymphocytes. Activation of the JAK/STAT pathway has been implicated in IL-7R signaling. We investigated which STAT complexes are formed upon stimulation of B cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (BCP-ALL) cells with IL-7. Gel retardation assays with STAT-binding oligonucleotides showed that IL-7 induces the formation of two major STAT complexes in BCP-ALL cells. Supershifts with anti-STAT antibodies identified these as STAT1 and STAT5 complexes. This pattern of STAT activation was seen in all BCP-ALL cases that respond to IL-7 in proliferation assays. IL-7 also induced STAT/DNA binding in BCP-ALL cases that failed to proliferate in response to IL-7, suggesting that the ability of IL-7R to activate the JAK/STAT pathway per se is not sufficient for proliferation induction. To determine the contribution of the cytoplasmic domain of the IL-7 receptor alpha chain (IL-7R alpha) to activation of STAT proteins, transfectants of the murine pro-B cell line BAF3 were made that express chimeric receptors consisting of the extracellular domain of human granulocyte colony-stimulating factor receptor (G-CSF-R) and the transmembrane and intracellular domains of human IL-7R alpha. Activation of the chimeric G-CSF-R/IL-7R alpha with G-CSF resulted in a full proliferative response and induced the phosphorylation of JAK1 but not JAK2. Major STAT complexes activated by G-CSF-R/IL-7R alpha contained STAT1 or STAT5, while some formation of STAT3-containing complexes was also seen. These findings establish that STAT1 and STAT5, and possibly STAT3, are activated upon stimulation of precursor B cells with IL-7. The data further indicate that the IL-7R alpha chains are directly involved in the activation of JAKs and STATs and have a major role in proliferative signaling in precursor B cells.