Clusterinisa75-80kDaheterodimericglycoprotein,thatisproducedinmosttissuesbutwhichexactbiologicalroleisstillnotclear.Particularly,itsroleinprotectionorpromotionofapoptosisisheavilydisputed,sincedatasupportingbothviewshavebeenreportedinseveralindependentstudies.Toclarifythisissue,andalsotodeterminewhetherclusterinexpressionitselfmightbeaffectedbyapoptosis,inthepresentstudy,ratthymocytesweretreatedwithdexamethasone,-asyntheticglucocorticoidthatelicitsapoptosisinthymocytes-,andclusterinmRNAexpressionwasanalyzedbysemi-quantitativeRT-PCRbeforeandafterinductionofapoptosis.Interestingly,neitherthetreatmentwithdexamethasoneinvitronortriggeringofapoptosisinvivoup-regulatedclusterinexpression,opposingtheviewthatclusterinisinvolvedinapoptoticprocesses.Ontheotherhand,anewclusterinmRNAisoformwasdetectedandisolated,whoseexpressionwasrestrictedtofreshlyisolatedthymocytes.Thisnovelisoformlacksthepost-translationalproteolyticcleavagesiteandisthereforepredictedtoencodeamonomericprotein.Thebiologicalfunctionundernormalcircumstances,however,willneedfurtherinvestigationsforclarification.Whileapoptosiscouldnotmodulateclusterinexpression,activationofthymocyteswithconcanavalinAandinterleukin-2resultedinup-regulationofclusterinmRNAlevel,indicatingthatclusterinexpressionisratherunderthecontrolofcellactivation-mediatedratherthanapoptosis-inducedsignals.
