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Alternative splicing signatures discriminate ATL cells from untransformed CD4+ counterparts deriving from HTLV-1 infected individuals

The clonal expansion and malignant transformation of HTLV-1 infected CD4+ T-cells have been linked to the reprogramming effects of HTLV-1 on host transcriptional profile. Coupled to transcription, alternative splicing (AS) is a post-transcriptional process that plays critical role in the complexity of transcriptome and splicing abnormalities frequently occur in cancer. To examine whether AS modifications associate with HTLV-1-associated leukemogenesis, we compared the exon expression profiles of ATL cells with that of CD4+ T-cell clones obtained by limited-dilution cloning of PBMC deriving from HTLV-1 carriers. 3 ATL cells and 12 untransformed infected clones clustering in infected, uninfected, PHA-stimulated or unstimulated CD4+ T cells were compared for exon RNA content using Exon Chip Human microarray. Hierarchical clustering analysis identified 12516 alternative spliced events (3642 genes) that clearly separated ATL samples from the 4 untransformed phenotypes mentioned above. In contrast, the exon content of 1539 genes differed between untransformed infected and uninfected T-CD4+ cells. Overall, less than 5% alternatively spliced genes were found differentially expressed at the transcriptional level. Microarray data were confirmed for 18 AS events using exon specific RT-PCR analysis. Pathway analysis of alternatively spliced genes (3642) in ATL cells revealed new AS-based pathways for p53 signaling, cell cycle and DNA replication while those of untransformed infected CD4+ T-cells were enriched in pathways for cellular movement and DNA repair. These findings unveil a new layer of complexity in the interplay between HTLV-1 and host cell gene expression machinery in which AS might play a central role in tumor initiation and promotion.

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This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

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Thenoz, M., Vernin, C., Pinatel, C. et al. Alternative splicing signatures discriminate ATL cells from untransformed CD4+ counterparts deriving from HTLV-1 infected individuals. Retrovirology 11 (Suppl 1), O66 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1186/1742-4690-11-S1-O66

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/1742-4690-11-S1-O66

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