Biochemical function of female-lethal (2)D/Wilms' tumor suppressor-1-associated proteins in alternative pre-mRNA splicing

Genetic and molecular data have implicated the Drosophila gene female-lethal (2)d (fl (2)d) in alternative splicing regulation of genes involved in sexual determination. Sex-specific splicing is under the control of the female-specific regulatory protein sex-lethal (SXL). Co-immunoprecipitation and mass spectrometry results indicate that SXL and FL (2)D form a complex and that the protein VIRILIZER and a Ran-binding protein implicated in protein nuclear import are also present in complexes containing FL (2)D. A human homolog of FL (2)D was identified and cloned. Interestingly, this gene encodes a protein (WTAP) that was previously found to interact with the Wilms' tumor suppressor-1 (WT1), an isoform of which binds to and co-localizes with splicing factors. Alternative splicing of transformer pre-mRNA, a target of SXL regulation, was affected by immunodepletion of hFL (2)D/WTAP from HeLa nuclear extracts, thus arguing for a biochemical function of FL (2)D/WTAP proteins in splicing regulation.