Epidermal growth factor induces serine phosphorylation of stathmin in a human colon carcinoma cell line (LIM 1215)

Changes in protein phosphorylation in the human colon carcinoma cell line LIM 1215 after stimulation with epidermal growth factor (EGF) have been analyzed by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and phosphoamino acid analysis. In addition to a number of tyrosine-phosphorylated proteins, a family of small proteins (M(r) 19,000-20,000) is maximally phosphorylated on serine within 5 min of EGF stimulation. One member of the family has been purified by a combination of two-dimensional electrophoresis and reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography and identified by amino acid sequence analysis as stathmin. Although phosphorylation of stathmin has been reported previously in leukemia cells and following stimulation of hemopoietic or lymphoid cells with several mitogenic agents, this is the first report of stathmin phosphorylation in response to EGF.