scholarly journals MicroRNAs Restrain Proliferation in BRAFV600E Melanocytic Nevi

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew S. McNeal ◽  
Rachel L. Belote ◽  
Hanlin Zeng ◽  
Kendra Barker ◽  
Rodrigo Torres ◽  
...  

AbstractBenign melanocytic nevi commonly form when melanocytes that acquire a BRAFV600E mutation undergo a period of rapid proliferation and subsequent arrest. Constitutive activation of MAPK signaling downstream of BRAF drives the initial proliferative phenotype. However, the factors that establish and maintain growth arrest in nevi remain elusive. The growth-arrested state of BRAFV600E melanocytes is not conferred by additional genetic mutations, suggesting a role for regulatory elements. We investigated the role of microRNAs in the initiation and maintenance of nevus arrest. Using primary human melanocytes, melanocytic nevi, and adjacent melanoma, we show that MIR211-5p and MIR328-3p are enriched in nevi compared to normal melanocytes, then subsequently downregulated in adjacent melanoma. Both MIR211-5p and MIR328-3p proved necessary effectors of BRAFV600E-induced growth arrest in human melanocytes. We identified microRNA target networks which, when suppressed, phenocopy BRAFV600E-induced arrest and converge on inhibition of AURKB to block cell cycle progression in primary human melanocytes.Statement of SignificanceWe describe a microRNA regulatory network that enforces BRAFV600E-induced growth arrest in human melanocytes during melanocytic nevus formation. De-regulation of MIR211-5p and MIR328-3p targets – which converge on AURKB – leads to cell cycle re-entry and melanoma progression. AURKB inhibition therefore provides a potential therapeutic intervention for melanoma prevention or treatment.

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Fransson ◽  
Angela Martinez-Monleon ◽  
Mathias Johansson ◽  
Rose-Marie Sjöberg ◽  
Caroline Björklund ◽  
...  

AbstractNeuroblastoma is the most common and deadly childhood tumor. Relapsed or refractory neuroblastoma has a very poor prognosis despite recent treatment advances. To investigate genomic alterations associated with relapse and therapy resistance, whole-genome sequencing was performed on diagnostic and relapsed lesions together with constitutional DNA from seven children. Sequencing of relapsed tumors indicates somatic alterations in diverse genes, including those involved in RAS-MAPK signaling, promoting cell cycle progression or function in telomere maintenance and immortalization. Among recurrent alterations, CCND1-gain, TERT-rearrangements, and point mutations in POLR2A, CDK5RAP, and MUC16 were shown in ≥ 2 individuals. Our cohort contained examples of converging genomic alterations in primary-relapse tumor pairs, indicating dependencies related to specific genetic lesions. We also detected rare genetic germline variants in DNA repair genes (e.g., BARD1, BRCA2, CHEK2, and WRN) that might cooperate with somatically acquired variants in these patients with highly aggressive recurrent neuroblastoma. Our data indicate the importance of monitoring recurrent neuroblastoma through sequential genomic characterization and that new therapeutic approaches combining the targeting of MAPK signaling, cell cycle progression, and telomere activity are required for this challenging patient group.


Marine Drugs ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 205
Author(s):  
Su-Jin Jeong ◽  
Jeong-Wook Choi ◽  
Min-Kyeong Lee ◽  
Youn-Hee Choi ◽  
Taek-Jeong Nam

Spirulina is a type of filamentous blue-green microalgae known to be rich in nutrients and to have pharmacological effects, but the effect of spirulina on the small intestine epithelium is not well understood. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the proliferative effects of spirulina crude protein (SPCP) on a rat intestinal epithelial cells IEC-6 to elucidate the mechanisms underlying its effect. First, the results of wound-healing and cell viability assays demonstrated that SPCP promoted migration and proliferation in a dose-dependent manner. Subsequently, when the mechanisms of migration and proliferation promotion by SPCP were confirmed, we found that the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and mitogen-activated protein (MAPK) signaling pathways were activated by phosphorylation. Cell cycle progression from G0/G1 to S phase was also promoted by SPCP through upregulation of the expression levels of cyclins and cyclin-dependent kinases (Cdks), which regulate cell cycle progression to the S phase. Meanwhile, the expression of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors (CKIs), such as p21 and p27, decreased with SPCP. In conclusion, our results indicate that activation of EGFR and its downstream signaling pathway by SPCP treatment regulates cell cycle progression. Therefore, these results contribute to the research on the molecular mechanism for SPCP promoting the migration and proliferation of rat intestinal epithelial cells.


2001 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 1710-1718 ◽  
Author(s):  
David J. Galgoczy ◽  
David P. Toczyski

ABSTRACT Despite the fact that eukaryotic cells enlist checkpoints to block cell cycle progression when their DNA is damaged, cells still undergo frequent genetic rearrangements, both spontaneously and in response to genotoxic agents. We and others have previously characterized a phenomenon (adaptation) in which yeast cells that are arrested at a DNA damage checkpoint eventually override this arrest and reenter the cell cycle, despite the fact that they have not repaired the DNA damage that elicited the arrest. Here, we use mutants that are defective in checkpoint adaptation to show that adaptation is important for achieving the highest possible viability after exposure to DNA-damaging agents, but it also acts as an entrée into some forms of genomic instability. Specifically, the spontaneous and X-ray-induced frequencies of chromosome loss, translocations, and a repair process called break-induced replication occur at significantly reduced rates in adaptation-defective mutants. This indicates that these events occur after a cell has first arrested at the checkpoint and then adapted to that arrest. Because malignant progression frequently involves loss of genes that function in DNA repair, adaptation may promote tumorigenesis by allowing genomic instability to occur in the absence of repair.


1995 ◽  
Vol 15 (12) ◽  
pp. 6686-6693 ◽  
Author(s):  
A M MacNicol ◽  
A J Muslin ◽  
E L Howard ◽  
A Kikuchi ◽  
M C MacNicol ◽  
...  

The Raf-1 gene product is activated in response to cellular stimulation by a variety of growth factors and hormones. Raf-1 activity has been implicated in both cellular differentiation and proliferation. We have examined the regulation of the Raf-1/MEK/MAP kinase (MAPK) pathway during embryonic development in the frog Xenopus laevis. We report that Raf-1, MEK, and MAPK activities are turned off following fertilization and remain undetectable up until blastula stages (stage 8), some 4 h later. Tight regulation of the Raf-1/MEK/MAPK pathway following fertilization is crucial for embryonic cell cycle progression. Inappropriate reactivation of MAPK activity by microinjection of oncogenic Raf-1 RNA results in metaphase cell cycle arrest and, consequently, embryonic lethality. Our findings demonstrate an absolute requirement, in vivo, for inactivation of the MAPK signaling pathway to allow normal cell cycle progression during the period of synchronous cell divisions which occur following fertilization. Further, we show that cytostatic factor effects are mediated through MEK and MAPK.


eLife ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew S McNeal ◽  
Rachel L Belote ◽  
Hanlin Zeng ◽  
Marcus Urquijo ◽  
Kendra Barker ◽  
...  

Benign melanocytic nevi frequently emerge when an acquired BRAFV600E mutation triggers unchecked proliferation and subsequent arrest in melanocytes. Recent observations have challenged the role of oncogene-induced senescence in melanocytic nevus formation, necessitating investigations into alternative mechanisms for the establishment and maintenance of proliferation arrest in nevi. We compared the transcriptomes of melanocytes from healthy human skin, nevi, and melanomas arising from nevi and identified a set of microRNAs as highly expressed nevus-enriched transcripts. Two of these microRNAs—MIR211-5p and MIR328-3p—induced mitotic failure, genome duplication, and proliferation arrest in human melanocytes through convergent targeting of AURKB. We demonstrate that BRAFV600E induces a similar proliferation arrest in primary human melanocytes that is both reversible and conditional. Specifically, BRAFV600E expression stimulates either arrest or proliferation depending on the differentiation state of the melanocyte. We report genome duplication in human melanocytic nevi, reciprocal expression of AURKB and microRNAs in nevi and melanomas, and rescue of arrested human nevus cells with AURKB expression. Taken together, our data describe an alternative molecular mechanism for melanocytic nevus formation that is congruent with both experimental and clinical observations.


1995 ◽  
Vol 311 (2) ◽  
pp. 549-554 ◽  
Author(s):  
M Wick ◽  
R Härönen ◽  
D Mumberg ◽  
C Bürger ◽  
B R Olsen ◽  
...  

The gene encoding tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases-3 (TIMP-3) is regulated during development, mitogenic stimulation and normal cell cycle progression. The TIMP-3 gene is structurally altered or deregulated in certain diseases of the eye and in tumour cells. A detailed knowledge of the TIMP-3 gene and its regulatory elements is therefore of paramount importance to understand its role in development, cell cycle progression and disease. In this study, we present the complete structure of the human TIMP-3 gene. We show that TIMP-3 is a TATA-less gene, which initiates transcription at one major site, is composed of five exons and four introns spanning a region of approximately 30 kb, and gives rise to three distinct mRNAs, presumably due to the usage of alternative polyadenylation signals. Using somatic cell hybrids the TIMP-3 locus was mapped to chromosomal location 22q13.1 We also show that the TIMP-3 5′ flanking region is sufficient to confer both high basal level expression in growing cells and cell cycle regulation in serum-stimulated cells. While the first 112 bases of the promoter, which harbour multiple Sp1 sites, were found to suffice for high basal level activity, the adjacent region spanning positions -463 and -112 was found to be a major determinant of serum inducibility. These results provide an important basis for further investigations addressing the role of TIMP-3 in physiological processes and pathological conditions.


Blood ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 112 (11) ◽  
pp. 1801-1801
Author(s):  
Anagha Borwankar ◽  
Alessandro Pastore ◽  
Aniruddha Deshpande ◽  
Yvonne Zimmermann ◽  
Christian Buske ◽  
...  

Abstract Mutations, activation or overexpression of cyclin D1 are common features of several human cancers including mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) which bears the characteristic t(11;14) translocation juxtaposing the cyclin D1 gene downstream of the immunoglobulin heavy chain enhancer. The loss of the 3’UTR of this gene has been reported in a majority of MCL patients as well as in cell lines. In order to assess the impact of the 3’UTR on cyclin D1 expression levels, we used YFP tagged cyclin D1 reporter plasmids to quantify cyclin D1 expression in cell lines with different mutations of the 3’UTR. Interestingly, protein expression was significantly higher upon deletion of the cyclin D1 3’UTR compared to the full-length cyclin D1 gene as assessed by flow cytometry (2.1 fold; n=3, P < 0.05). Applying a more sensitive dual-luciferase reporter assay where a constitutively expressed luciferase gene was fused to the cyclin D1 3’UTR, the normalized firefly luciferase activity was reduced significantly to 23% as compared to luciferase only (the empty vactor). We then introduced 3’UTR mutations observed in MCL patients (insertion of adenosine between nucleotides 2308 and 2309 and a deletion of the tri-nucleotide sequence TCA from 2309–2311 of the full length cyclin D1-YFP reporter cDNA), which resulted in a significant increase of cyclin D1 expression (1.3 fold both in Ins308 and Δ309-311) compared to full length cyclin D1, (P< 0.05) showing that these mutations contribute to cyclinD1 overexpression in these patients. Subsequently, the 3’UTR was scanned for elements potentially regulating cyclin D1 expression, and putative microRNA binding sites were identified using the TargetScan and PicTar microRNA target prediction software. The most interesting candidate microRNAs include the miR-15/16 family and the miR-17–92 cluster, both of which have been shown to be involved in lymphoid malignancies and regulate cell cycle progression. In order to confirm whether the cyclin D1 3’UTR is a direct target of these microRNAs, we cloned the cyclin D1 3’UTR target region containing putative miR-15/16 or miR-17/20a binding sites and transfected these reporter constructs into HeLa cells. Upon introduction of oligonucleotide mimics of the miR15/16 microRNAs or a plasmid expressing microRNAs of the miR-17 cluster, the normalized luciferase activity of the respective luciferase reporters was reduced significantly to 41% (miR-15), 33% (miR-16) and 79% (miR-17/20a), respectively. Moreover, introduction of mutations in the seed sequences of the putative microRNA recognition sites rendered these constructs insensitive to inhibition by these microRNAs, confirming the specificity of the microRNA::target interaction. These data confirm that the binding of these microRNAs play an important role in the repression of cyclin D1 mediated by the 3’UTR and mutation or deletion result in cyclin D1 overexpression in MCL as well as other human tumors.


mBio ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rocío García-Rodas ◽  
Radames J. B. Cordero ◽  
Nuria Trevijano-Contador ◽  
Guilhem Janbon ◽  
Frédérique Moyrand ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The fungal pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans has several virulence factors, among which the most important is a polysaccharide capsule. The size of the capsule is variable and can increase significantly during infection. In this work, we investigated the relationship between capsular enlargement and the cell cycle. Capsule growth occurred primarily during the G1 phase. Real-time visualization of capsule growth demonstrated that this process occurred before the appearance of the bud and that capsule growth arrested during budding. Benomyl, which arrests the cells in G2/M, inhibited capsule growth, while sirolimus (rapamycin) addition, which induces G1 arrest, resulted in cells with larger capsule. Furthermore, we have characterized a mutant strain that lacks a putative G1/S cyclin. This mutant showed an increased capacity to enlarge the capsule, both in vivo (using Galleria mellonella as the host model) and in vitro. In the absence of Cln1, there was a significant increase in the production of extracellular vesicles. Proteomic assays suggest that in the cln1 mutant strain, there is an upregulation of the glyoxylate acid cycle. Besides, this cyclin mutant is avirulent at 37°C, which correlates with growth defects at this temperature in rich medium. In addition, the cln1 mutant showed lower intracellular replication rates in murine macrophages. We conclude that cell cycle regulatory elements are involved in the modulation of the expression of the main virulence factor in C. neoformans. IMPORTANCE Cryptococcus neoformans is a pathogenic fungus that has significant incidence worldwide. Its main virulence factor is a polysaccharide capsule that can increase in size during infection. In this work, we demonstrate that this process occurs in a specific phase of the cell cycle, in particular, in G1. In agreement, mutants that have an abnormal longer G1 phase show larger capsule sizes. We believe that our findings are relevant because they provide a link between capsule growth, cell cycle progression, and virulence in C. neoformans that reveals new aspects about the pathogenicity of this fungus. Moreover, our findings indicate that cell cycle elements could be used as antifungal targets in C. neoformans by affecting both the growth of the cells and the expression of the main virulence factor of this pathogenic yeast.


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