A Novel Splice Variant of Fibroblast Growth Factor Receptor 2 in Human Leukemia HL-60 Cells

Fibroblast growth factor receptors (FGFRs) genes have been shown to be translocated in multiple myeloma (MM) and myeloproliferative disorder (MPD), indicating an important role for the FGFRs in hematologic malignancies. Here, we describe a novel splice variant of FGFR2 (FGFR2AT-I) arising from skipping exons 7-10 in human myeloid leukemia HL-60 cells, encoding a FGFR2 in which the Ig-like-III domain is deleted while the remainder of the mature molecule is fused in-frame to the transmembrane and COOH-terminal cytoplasmic kinases. Binding assays demonstrated that the FGFR2AT-I was able to bind FGF1, FGF2, and FGF7, leading to loss of ligand binding specificity. Furthermore, overexpression of FGFR2AT-I resulted in increased AKT and MAPK activation, conferring a survival advantage. Taken together, these findings indicate that the dysregulation of FGFRsʹ function by aberrant mRNA splicing contributes to tumor progression.