The importance of C/EBP proteins in B cell biology is suggested by the occurrence of functionally important C/EBP binding sites in Ig gene enhancers and promoters, and the knowledge that family member NF-IL-6 is induced in other systems in response to regulators of B cell differentiation. We have studied the expression pattern and activity of C/EBP family transcriptional regulators in B cells at different developmental stages by using B cell lines and normal splenic B cells. Two family members,

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... Ig/EBP and NF-IL-6, seem to be the major regulators of C/EBP site-dependent transcriptional activity in B cells. Negative regulator Ig/EBP is predominantly present in early B cells; activator NF-IL-6 increases in more mature B cells and is induced by LPS activation of splenic B cells. LIP, an N-terminally truncated form of NF-IL-6, was found in most B cell lines tested; LIP can act as a weak transcriptional activator in B cell lines. Partly as a result of the differential amounts of C/EBP family proteins, C/EBP sites do not function as activator sites in early B cells but are activator sites in terminally differentiated B cells.