Fig. 7. Effects of deletion mutants and modifications of p120ctn on their subcellular distribution and on the morphology of 1205-Lu cells. The branching phenotype induced by isoforms 2A and 3A was not affected by the deletion of the N-terminal nuclear localization signal (A,B). The deletion of amino acids 63-232 from isoform 2A (2ANS) did not completely abolish the branching phenotype (C), but the deletion construct of isoform 3A (3AAK), with amino acids 205-316 deleted, showed predominantly cytoplasmic localization and only a few lamellipodial protrusions of transiently transfected 1205-Lu cells (D). The nuclear localization of isoform 4A, induced either through the SV40 nuclear localization signal (E,G) or ubinuclein nuclear localization domain (F,H) joined to the amino terminus of 4A, did not induce the branching phenotype in transiently transfected 1205-Lu cells. When the alternatively spliced exon B was included in the transcript (1AB), it abolished both the nuclear localization and the prominent branching phenotype induced by isoform 1A (I). However, the site-directed mutagenesis of the nuclear export signal within exon B (1ABm) was not sufficient to restore the phenotype induced by isoform 1A (J). Red signal, MAb M2. Blue signal, DAPI. Bar, 50 µm.

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