Target cell specificity of two species of human interferon-alpha produced in Escherichia coli and of hybrid molecules derived from them.

Plasmids containing cDNAs for human interferon (IfN) alpha-1, IFN alpha-2, and several hybrids of the two cDNAs, all joined identically to an Escherichia coli lac promoter fragment gave rise, in E. coli, to fused interferons (fIFNs) that had very different target-cell specificities. fIFN alpha-1 had a lower specific activity on human WISH cells than on bovine MDBK cells, while fIFN alpha-2 showed the opposite behavior. fIFN hybrids with the NH2-proximal half of fIFN alpha-2 behaved qualitatively like fIFN alpha-1, and those with the NH2-proximal half of fIFN alpha-2, behaved like fIFN alpha-2. On mouse L929 cells, fIFN alpha-2 was almost inactive, while fIFN alpha-1 showed relatively high activity. In this case, the fIFN hybrids with the COOH-proximal half of IFN alpha-1 showed activity on mouse cells, while the reciprocal hybrid did not. In many cases, the activity spectrum of the hybrids was very different from that of either parent. We propose that the IFN molecule has either two binding sites or two regions constituting the binding site, one in the COOH- and the other in the NH2-proximal half. The experimental findings can be accounted for if the fits of the two sites to their receptor counterparts on different cell lines are independent of one another.