Identification of a signal-transduction pathway shared by haematopoietic growth factors with diverse biological specificity.

The haematopoietic growth factors multi-colony-stimulating factor, granulocyte/macrophage colony-stimulating factor, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor and interleukin 2 specifically control the production and proliferation of distinct leucocyte series. Each growth factor acts on a unique surface receptor associated with an appropriate signal-transduction apparatus. In this report we identify a 68 kDa substrate which is phosphorylated after stimulation of different cell types with multi-colony-stimulating factor, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor and interleukin 2. The 68 kDa substrate is also phosphorylated in each cell line stimulated with synthetic diacylglycerol, a direct activator of protein kinase C. Interestingly, granulocyte/macrophage colony-stimulating factor does not induce phosphorylation of the 68 kDa molecule. The 68 kDa molecule that is phosphorylated after stimulation with each ligand yielded similar peptide maps after chymotryptic digestion; furthermore, the substrate was always phosphorylated on threonine residues. Phosphorylation of the same residues in the 68 kDa substrate suggests that activation of protein kinase C is one common signal-transduction event associated with the action of multi-colony-stimulating factor, granulocyte colony-stimulating factor and interleukin 2.