| Description | Various transcripts: involving exons 1, 6, and 8 (145 amino acids) or 1, and 8 (54 amino acids) in the neurectoderm; transcripts involving exons 1,5,6,8 or 1,4,5,6,8, or 1,5,6,7,8, or 1,2,6,8, or 1,2,5,6,8 or 1,2,3,6,8 in leukemic cells; altogether, 8 different transcripts of BAALC, giving rise to 5 different proteins |
| Expression | Transcripts involving exons 1, 6, and 8, or 1, and 8 are found in neurectoderm tissues; BAALC is also expressed in normal early progenitor cells (CD34+) of the hematopoietic tissues: both uncommitted and lineage-committed progenitor cells (lymphoid T- and B-cell progenitors, myeloid and erytroid progenitors); down regulation occurs with cell differentiation; various transcripts are found in leukemic blasts (see above and below); also found expressed in the mesoderm and the muscle in the mouse |
| Localisation | Cytoplasmic; found adjacent to the cell membrane in the mouse; may be localized to lipid rafts and may play a synaptic role in the rat brain |
| Homology | No homology with other proteins; the ortholog lacks in lower vertebrates. |
| Entity | 1/4 of acute non lymphocytic leukemia (ANLL) cases and 2/3 of acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) case have been found to exhibit high BAALC expression ; no expression in chronic leukemias (e.g. chronic myeloid leukemia (CML)); expression in blast crisis of CML. |
| Disease | ANLL cases: M0 ANLL, M1, M2 and M4eo cases, rarely M4 or M5 cases; no M3 case so far; association with the more immature blasts; no correlation with age, sex, haemoglobin level or platelets count, or FLT3 phenotype; BAALC expression is associated with a higher WBC count |
| Prognosis | Poor prognosis is associated with BAALC overexpression in ANLL cases: at 3 yrs, only 35-40% of patients with high BAALC expression were alive; independant risk factor; in particular, BAALC overexpression remains a poor prognostic factor in the absence of FLT3 internal tandem duplication. |
| Cytogenetics | Patients present with normal karyotypes, with +8, or with various anomalies. |
| | |
| Entity | Glioblastoma |
| Note | BAALC in also upregulated in normal astrocytes |
| | |
| BAALC, the human member of a novel mammalian neuroectoderm gene lineage, is implicated in hematopoiesis and acute leukemia. |
| Tanner SM, Austin JL, Leone G, Rush LJ, Plass C, Heinonen K, Mrˆ„zek K, Sill H, Knuutila S, Kolitz JE, Archer KJ, Caligiuri MA, Bloomfield CD, de La Chapelle A |
| Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2001 ; 98 (24) : 13901-13906. |
| PMID 11707601 |
| |
| BAALC, a novel marker of human hematopoietic progenitor cells. |
| Baldus CD, Tanner SM, Kusewitt DF, Liyanarachchi S, Choi C, Caligiuri MA, Bloomfield CD, de la Chapelle A |
| Experimental hematology. 2003 ; 31 (11) : 1051-1056. |
| PMID 14585369 |
| |
| BAALC expression predicts clinical outcome of de novo acute myeloid leukemia patients with normal cytogenetics: a Cancer and Leukemia Group B Study. |
| Baldus CD, Tanner SM, Ruppert AS, Whitman SP, Archer KJ, Marcucci G, Caligiuri MA, Carroll AJ, Vardiman JW, Powell BL, Allen SL, Moore JO, Larson RA, Kolitz JE, de la Chapelle A, Bloomfield CD |
| Blood. 2003 ; 102 (5) : 1613-1618. |
| PMID 12750167 |
| |
| Molecular heterogeneity and prognostic biomarkers in adults with acute myeloid leukemia and normal cytogenetics. |
| Marcucci G, Mrˆ„zek K, Bloomfield CD |
| Current opinion in hematology. 2005 ; 12 (1) : 68-75. |
| PMID 15604894 |
| |
| Baalc, a marker of mesoderm and muscle. |
| Satoskar AA, Tanner SM, Weinstein M, Qualman SJ, de la Chapelle A |
| Gene expression patterns : GEP. 2005 ; 5 (4) : 463-473. |
| PMID 15749074 |
| |
| BAALC 1-6-8 protein is targeted to postsynaptic lipid rafts by its N-terminal myristoylation and palmitoylation, and interacts with alpha, but not beta, subunit of Ca/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase II. |
| Wang X, Tian QB, Okano A, Sakagami H, Moon IS, Kondo H, Endo S, Suzuki T |
| Journal of neurochemistry. 2005 ; 92 (3) : 647-659. |
| PMID 15659234 |
| |
| Induction of BAALC and down regulation of RAMP3 in astrocytes treated with differentiation inducers. |
| Moodbidri MS, Shirsat NV |
| Cell biology international. 2006 ; 30 (3) : 210-213. |
| PMID 16376586 |
| |
| BAALC expression and FLT3 internal tandem duplication mutations in acute myeloid leukemia patients with normal cytogenetics: prognostic implications. |
| Baldus CD, Thiede C, Soucek S, Bloomfield CD, Thiel E, Ehninger G |
| Journal of clinical oncology : official journal of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. 2006 ; 24 (5) : 790-797. |
| PMID 16418499 |
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