A single amino acid alteration in cytoplasmic domain determines IL-2 promoter activation by ligation of CD28 but not inducible costimulator (ICOS).

The CD28 family molecules, CD28, and inducible costimulator (ICOS) all provide positive costimulatory signals. However, unlike CD28, ICOS does not costimulate IL-2 secretion. The YMNM motif that exists in the CD28 cytoplasmic domain is a known binding site for phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3-K) and Grb2. ICOS possesses the YMFM motif in the corresponding region of CD28 that binds PI3-K but not Grb2. We postulated that the reason that ICOS does not have the ability to induce IL-2 production is because it fails to recruit Grb2. To verify this hypothesis, we generated a mutant ICOS gene that contains the CD28 YMNM motif and measured IL-2 promoter activation after ICOS ligation. The results indicated that ICOS became competent to activate the IL-2 promoter by this single alteration. Further analysis demonstrated that Grb2 binding to ICOS was sufficient to activate the NFAT/AP-1 site in the IL-2 promoter and that the cytoplasmic domain of CD28 outside of the YMNM motif is required for activation of the CD28RE/AP-1 and NF-kappaB sites. Together, these observations lead us to believe that the difference of a single amino acid, which affects Grb2 binding ability, may define a functional difference between the CD28- and ICOS-mediated costimulatory signals.