CHARACTERIZATION OF A NOVEL, HUMAN CYTOTOXIC LYMPHOCYTE-SPECIFIC SERINE PROTEASE CDNA CLONE (CSP-C)

Abstract

A human cDNA clone encoding a novel serine protease, cytotoxic serine protease-C(CSP-C), has been isolated from a cDNA library prepared from recombinant interleukin-2 (IL-2)-activated lymphocytes of a patient with a large granular lymphoproliferative disorder. The clone has a 741-base pair open reading frame encoding a putative 246-amino acid protein. The protein sequence contains the catalytic charge relay system characteristic of a serine protease and the conserved N-terminal amino acid sequence of the mature cytotoxic lymphocyte serine proteases found in both mouse and human. The amino acid sequence of CSP-C has 71% identity with the previously reported cytotoxic serine protease-B(CSP-B)/..