Tumor hypoxia impairs NK cell cytotoxicity through SHP-1-mediated attenuation of STAT3 and ERK signaling pathways
Abstract Natural killer (NK) cells are innate immune effectors with potent anti-tumor activity. Nonetheless, tumor cells have the ability to create an immunosuppressive microenvironment, thereby escaping from immune surveillance. Although accumulating evidence indicates that microenvironmental hypoxia plays an important role in favoring tumor development and immune evasion, it is still unclear how hypoxia directly impairs NK cell anti-tumor activity. In this study, we confirmed that hypoxic NK cells show significantly lower cytotoxicity against tumor cells. Consistent with this, we also found that the reduction in NK cell cytotoxicity resulting from hypoxia is related to the lower expression of granzyme B, IFN-γ, degranulation marker CD107a, as well as killer activation receptors including NKp30, NKp46, and NKG2D on NK cells. More importantly, we further demonstrated that a reduction in the phosphorylation levels of ERK and STAT3 secondary to hypoxia are tightly associated with the attenuated NK cell cytotoxicity. Focusing on the mechanism responsible for reducing phosphorylation levels of ERK and STAT3, we revealed that the activation of protein tyrosine phosphatase SHP-1 (src homology region 2 domain-containing phosphatase-1) following hypoxia may play an essential role in this process. When knocking down SHP-1 or blocking its activity using a specific inhibitor TPI-1, we were able to partially restore NK cell cytotoxicity under hypoxia. Taken together, we demonstrated that hypoxia can impair NK cell cytotoxicity by decreasing the phosphorylation levels of ERK and STAT3 in a SHP-1 dependent manner. Therefore, targeting SHP-1 could provide an approach to enhance NK cell-based tumor immunotherapy.