Scientific Publications by FDA Staff

Nat Commun 2015 Jan 14;6:6025

Activating mutations of STAT5B and STAT3 in lymphomas derived from gammadelta-T or NK cells.

Kucuk C, Jiang B, Hu X, Zhang W, Chan JK, Xiao W, Lack N, Alkan C, Williams JC, Avery KN, Kavak P, Scuto A, Sen E, Gaulard P, Staudt L, Iqbal J, Zhang W, Cornish A, Gong Q, Yang Q, Sun H, d'Amore F, Leppa S, Liu W, Fu K, de Leval L, McKeithan T, Chan WC

Lymphomas arising from NK or gammadelta-T cells are very aggressive diseases and little is known regarding their pathogenesis. Here we report frequent activating mutations of STAT3 and STAT5B in NK/T-cell lymphomas (n=51), gammadelta-T-cell lymphomas (n=43) and their cell lines (n=9) through next generation and/or Sanger sequencing. STAT5B N642H is particularly frequent in all forms of gammadelta-T-cell lymphomas. STAT3 and STAT5B mutations are associated with increased phosphorylated protein and a growth advantage to transduced cell lines or normal NK cells. Growth-promoting activity of the mutants can be partially inhibited by a JAK1/2 inhibitor. Molecular modelling and surface plasmon resonance measurements of the N642H mutant indicate a marked increase in binding affinity of the phosphotyrosine-Y699 with the mutant histidine. This is associated with the prolonged persistence of the mutant phosphoSTAT5B and marked increase of binding to target sites. Our findings suggest that JAK-STAT pathway inhibition may represent a therapeutic strategy.