Hormone withdrawal triggers a premature and sustained gene activation from delayed secondary glucocorticoid response elements.

Glucocorticoid regulatory elements, denoted GREs and delayed secondary GREs (sGREs), bind the purified glucocorticoid receptors via distinctive sequence motifs and confer a primary and delayed secondary hormone inducibility, respectively, upon a linked reporter construct in stably transfected mammalian cells. The delayed secondary responses, but not the primary responses, are preceded by a time lag of several hours and blocked by protein synthesis inhibitors. In this report, we further characterized and distinguished these hormonal inductions.

Delayed secondary glucocorticoid response elements. Unusual nucleotide motifs specify glucocorticoid receptor binding to transcribed regions of alpha 2u-globulin DNA.

Glucocorticoids stimulate the transcription of rat alpha 2u-globulin (RUG) genes. Because this induction occurs after a time lag of several hours and is blocked by inhibitors of protein synthesis, it exemplifies a delayed secondary response to steroid hormones. In this report, we show that a region of RUG-transcribed DNA (approximately +1800 to +2174) contains multiple footprint sites for glucocorticoid receptor that are, apparently, organized into at least three independent binding clusters.

Purified glucocorticoid receptors bind selectively in vitro to a cloned DNA fragment that mediates a delayed secondary response to glucocorticoids in vivo.

We have identified and characterized a 206-base-pair region downstream from rat alpha 2u-globulin promoter that specifically mediates a delayed secondary response to glucocorticoids. Unlike positive primary glucocorticoid response elements (GREs), this regulatory element, termed delayed sGRE, dictates an inductive process preceded by a time lag of several hours and blocked by the protein synthesis inhibitor cycloheximide. Reminiscent of GREs and negative GREs (nGREs), a delayed sGRE confers hormonal regulation upon a linked heterologous promoter from a downstream position with respect to transcription start site and, remarkably, also interacts selectively with purified glucocorticoid receptor.

The first intron of the human growth hormone gene contains a binding site for glucocorticoid receptor.

Glucocorticoid receptor (GCR) protein stimulates transcription from a variety of cellular genes. We show here that GCR partially purified from rat liver binds specifically to a site within the first intron of the human growth hormone (hGH) gene, approximately 100 base pairs downstream from the start of hGH transcription. GCR binding is selectively inhibited by methylation of two short, symmetrically arranged clusters of guanine residues within this site.

Structure and specific DNA binding of the rat liver glucocorticoid receptor.

During recent years major advances have been made in our understanding of glucocorticoid mechanism of action. This progress has been made possible by access to purified glucocorticoid receptor in significant amounts as well as by application of hybrid DNA technology within the field of glucocorticoid control of gene expression. Especially the mammary tumour virus genome has turned out to be a convenient experimental system suitable for such investigations.