Cloning and Functional Characterization of the Murine Caspase-3 Gene Promoter

Several studies have shown that the levels of caspase-3 are upregulated under different conditions of apoptosis. Previously, we have shown that activation of T cells through the TCR leads to the upregulation of caspase- 3 levels. These findings highlight the importance of regulating the expression of caspase-3 in order to prevent premature cell death. To better understand the regulation of the caspase-3 gene, a portion of the 5′- untranslated region was cloned, sequenced, and characterized. The segment of the 5′-flanking region of the caspase-3 gene was also cloned upstream of a luciferase reporter gene, demonstrating that this fragment contains promoter activity. Higher luciferase expression was found with several of the promoter deletion constructs in Jurkat T cells but not the mouse Neuro-2A neuroblastoma cell line, suggesting the presence of a Tcell– specific regulated region. The importance of these sequences is further supported by the genomic organization of the human and mouse caspase-3 promoter regions. These findings demonstrated that the−2245/+14 region of the caspase-3 promoter shows constitutive levels of expression, and that several regions of the promoter play a role in basal regulation. Finally, some of the conserved transcription factor binding sites identified between the human and mouse promoters appear to play an important role in lymphoid cells.