Targeting of a distinctive protein-serine phosphatase to the protein kinase-like domain of the atrial natriuretic peptide receptor.

Protein kinase-related domains of unknown function are present in the JAK family of protein tyrosine kinases and in receptor/guanylyl cyclases. I used the yeast two-hybrid system to screen for proteins interacting with the kinase-like domain of the atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP) receptor/guanylyl cyclase. A yeast strain was constructed expressing a fusion of this kinase-like domain to the lexA DNA-binding domain and containing a HIS3 gene under the control of lexA upstream activating sequences. These yeast cells were transformed with a plasmid library of mouse embryo cDNA fragments fused to the VP16 transcriptional activation domain. Cells containing VP16-fusion proteins interacting with the lexA-kinase-like domain fusion protein were selected by growth in the absence of histidine. A partial-length cDNA clone isolated by using this approach encoded a protein that interacted specifically with the ANP-receptor protein kinase-like domain both in yeast cells and in vitro. Tissue-specific expression of a 2.2-kb mRNA hybridizing to this cDNA paralleled the known pattern of ANP-receptor mRNA expression. A full-length cDNA clone isolated from a rat lung library was predicted to encode a 55-kDa protein containing at its amino terminus a targeting domain that binds to the ANP-receptor kinase-like domain and containing at its carboxyl terminus a putative protein-serine phosphatase domain. This protein is a possible candidate for the phosphatase involved in desensitizing the ANP receptor. Targeting of regulatory proteins may be an important function of protein kinase-like domains.