Human Natural Killer Cell microRNA: Differential Expression of MIR181A1B1 and MIR181A2B2 Genes Encoding Identical Mature microRNAs

Natural killer (NK) and T lymphocytes share many properties, yet only NK cells respond rapidly to infection and cancer without pre-activation. We found that few microRNAs (miRNAs) differed significantly between human NK and T cells. Among those miRNAs, miR-181a, and miR-181b levels rose during NK cell differentiation. Prior studies indicate that miR-181a and miR-181b are critical for human NK cell development and are co-transcribed from genes on chromosome 1 (MIR181A1B1) and on chromosome 9 (MIR181A2B2). We mapped human MIR181A1B1 and MIR181A2B2 transcription start sites (TSS) to 78.3 kb and 34.0 kb upstream of the mature miRNAs, generating predominantly unspliced transcripts of 80-127 kb and ~60 kb, respectively. Unlike mouse thymocytes, human T cells expressed both MIR181A1B1 and MIR181A2B2. We tested the hypothesis that NK cells differentially transcribe the two genes during development and in response to immune regulatory cytokines. During NK cell differentiation, MIR181A2B2 expression rose dramatically and exceeded that of MIR181A1B1. TGF-β treatment increased NK cell MIR181A2B2 transcription, while IL-2, IL-15, and IL-12/IL-18 treatments upregulated MIR181A1B1. The MIR181A2B2 promoter was strongly transactivated by SMAD3 and SMAD4 transcription factors, suggesting that TGF-β signaling upregulates MIR181A2B2 expression, at least in part, through SMAD-dependent promoter activation.