scholarly journals The Cross Talk Between p53 and mTOR Pathways in Response to Physiological and Genotoxic Stresses

Author(s):  
Danrui Cui ◽  
Ruirui Qu ◽  
Dian Liu ◽  
Xiufang Xiong ◽  
Tingbo Liang ◽  
...  

The tumor suppressor p53 is activated upon multiple cellular stresses, including DNA damage, oncogene activation, ribosomal stress, and hypoxia, to induce cell cycle arrest, apoptosis, and senescence. Mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), an evolutionarily conserved serine/threonine protein kinase, serves as a central regulator of cell growth, proliferation, and survival by coordinating nutrients, energy, growth factors, and oxygen levels. p53 dysfunction and mTOR pathway hyperactivation are hallmarks of human cancer. The balance between response to stresses or commitment to cell proliferation and survival is governed by various regulatory loops between the p53 and mTOR pathways. In this review, we first briefly introduce the tumor suppressor p53 and then describe the upstream regulators and downstream effectors of the mTOR pathway. Next, we discuss the role of p53 in regulating the mTOR pathway through its transcriptional and non-transcriptional effects. We further describe the complicated role of the mTOR pathway in modulating p53 activity. Finally, we discuss the current knowledge and future perspectives on the coordinated regulation of the p53 and mTOR pathways.

Author(s):  
Di Shi ◽  
Peng Jiang

As a key transcription factor, the evolutionarily conserved tumor suppressor p53 (encoded by TP53) plays a central role in response to various cellular stresses. A variety of biological processes are regulated by p53 such as cell cycle arrest, apoptosis, senescence and metabolism. Besides these well-known roles of p53, accumulating evidence show that p53 also regulates innate immune and adaptive immune responses. p53 influences the innate immune system by secreted factors that modulate macrophage function to suppress tumourigenesis. Dysfunction of p53 in cancer affects the activity and recruitment of T and myeloid cells, resulting in immune evasion. p53 can also activate key regulators in immune signaling pathways which support or impede tumor development. Hence, it seems that the tumor suppressor p53 exerts its tumor suppressive effect to a considerable extent by modulating the immune response. In this review, we concisely discuss the emerging connections between p53 and immune responses, and their impact on tumor progression. Understanding the role of p53 in regulation of immunity will help to developing more effective anti-tumor immunotherapies for patients with TP53 mutation or depletion.


2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (39) ◽  
pp. 4605-4610 ◽  
Author(s):  
Atena Soleimani ◽  
Farzad Rahmani ◽  
Gordon A. Ferns ◽  
Mikhail Ryzhikov ◽  
Amir Avan ◽  
...  

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the leading cause of cancer death worldwide and its incidence is increasing. In most patients with CRC, the PI3K/AKT signaling axis is over-activated. Regulatory oncogenic or tumor suppressor microRNAs (miRNAs) for PI3K/AKT signaling regulate cell proliferation, migration, invasion, angiogenesis, as well as resistance to chemo-/radio-therapy in colorectal cancer tumor tissues. Thus, regulatory miRNAs of PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling represent novel biomarkers for new patient diagnosis and obtaining clinically invaluable information from post-treatment CRC patients for improving therapeutic strategies. This review summarizes the current knowledge of miRNAs’ regulatory roles of PI3K/AKT signaling in CRC pathogenesis.


Author(s):  
Sha Sumei ◽  
Kong Xiangyun ◽  
Chen Fenrong ◽  
Sun Xueguang ◽  
Hu Sijun ◽  
...  

Background/AimsThe role of DHRS3 in human cancer remains unclear. Our study explored the role of DHRS3 in gastric cancer (GC) and its clinicopathological significance and associated mechanisms.MaterialsBisulfite-assisted genomic sequencing PCR and a Mass-Array system were used to evaluate and quantify the methylation levels of the promoter. The expression levels and biological function of DHRS3 was examined by both in vitro and in vivo assays. A two-way hierarchical cluster analysis was used to classify the methylation profiles, and the correlation between the methylation status of the DHRS3 promoter and the clinicopathological characteristics of GC were then assessed.ResultsThe DHRS3 promoter was hypermethylated in GC samples, while the mRNA and protein levels of DHRS3 were significantly downregulated. Ectopic expression of DHRS3 in GC cells inhibited cell proliferation and migration in vitro, decreased tumor growth in vivo. DHRS3 methylation was correlated with histological type and poor differentiation of tumors. GC patients with high degrees of CpG 9.10 methylation had shorter survival times than those with lower methylation.ConclusionDHRS3 was hypermethylated and downregulated in GC patients. Reduced expression of DHRS3 is implicated in gastric carcinogenesis, which suggests DHRS3 is a tumor suppressor.


2001 ◽  
Vol 114 (10) ◽  
pp. 1867-1873 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.A. Klibanov ◽  
H.M. O'Hagan ◽  
M. Ljungman

The tumor suppressor p53 is a nucleocytoplasmic shuttling protein that accumulates in the nucleus of cells exposed to various cellular stresses. One important role of nuclear p53 is to mobilize a stress response by transactivating target genes such as the p21(Waf1) gene. In this study, we investigated more closely the localization of p53 in cells following various stresses. Immunocytochemistry of fixed human fibroblasts treated with either UV light, the kinase and transcription inhibitor DRB or the proteasome inhibitor MG132 revealed abundant p53 localized to the nucleus. When cells treated with UV or DRB were permeabilized prior to fixation to allow soluble proteins to diffuse, the nuclear p53 signal was abolished. However, in cells treated with MG132, residual p53 localized to distinct large foci. Furthermore, nucleolin co-localized with p53 to these foci, suggesting that these foci were nucleolar structures. Interestingly, the MDM2 protein was found to co-localize with p53 to nucleolar structures following proteasome inhibition. Our results suggest that the p53 proteins accumulating in the nucleus following UV-irradiation or blockage of transcription are freely soluble and, thus, should be able to roam the nucleus to ensure high occupancy of p53 binding sites. However, inhibition of proteasome activity may be a unique stress in that it leads to the sequestering of p53 proteins to the nucleolus, thereby blunting the p53-mediated transactivation of target genes.


2011 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 451-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Garcia-Echeverria

Substantial drug discovery efforts have been devoted, over the last few years, to identifying and developing mTOR (mammalian target of rapamycin) kinase modulators. This has resulted in a number of mTOR inhibitors with different mechanisms of action and/or distinct protein and lipid kinase selectivity profiles. As briefly reviewed in the present paper, these compounds have provided us with a better understanding of the roles of mTOR and other phosphoinositide 3-kinase/mTOR pathway components in human cancer biology, and a few of them have already demonstrated clinical benefit in cancer patients.


1998 ◽  
Vol 5 (8) ◽  
pp. 669-677 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim L Beumer ◽  
Hermien L Roepers-Gajadien ◽  
Iris S Gademan ◽  
Paul PW van Buul ◽  
Gabriel Gil-Gomez ◽  
...  

1998 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 1197-1206 ◽  
Author(s):  
W H Liggett ◽  
D Sidransky

Since its discovery as a CDKI (cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor) in 1993, the tumor suppressor p16 (INK4A/MTS-1/CDKN2A) has gained widespread importance in cancer. The frequent mutations and deletions of p16 in human cancer cell lines first suggested an important role for p16 in carcinogenesis. This genetic evidence for a causal role was significantly strengthened by the observation that p16 was frequently inactivated in familial melanoma kindreds. Since then, a high frequency of p16 gene alterations were observed in many primary tumors. In human neoplasms, p16 is silenced in at least three ways: homozygous deletion, methylation of the promoter, and point mutation. The first two mechanisms comprise the majority of inactivation events in most primary tumors. Additionally, the loss of p16 may be an early event in cancer progression, because deletion of at least one copy is quite high in some premalignant lesions. p16 is a major target in carcinogenesis, rivaled in frequency only by the p53 tumor-suppressor gene. Its mechanism of action as a CDKI has been elegantly elucidated and involves binding to and inactivating the cyclin D-cyclin-dependent kinase 4 (or 6) complex, and thus renders the retinoblastoma protein inactive. This effect blocks the transcription of important cell-cycle regulatory proteins and results in cell-cycle arrest. Although p16 may be involved in cell senescence, the physiologic role of p16 is still unclear. Future work will focus on studies of the upstream events that lead to p16 expression and its mechanism of regulation, and perhaps lead to better therapeutic strategies that can improve the clinical course of many lethal cancers.


2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (4_suppl) ◽  
pp. 43-43
Author(s):  
Da Wang ◽  
Roland Chiu ◽  
John Theodorus Plukker ◽  
Robert P. Coppes

43 Background: Despite modern advances in the treatment of esophageal cancer (EC), using neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (CRT) and esophagectomy, most patients face poor outcome. Growing evidence indicates that cancer stem cells (CSCs) might contribute to the poor prospects. CSCs are usually resistant to CRT and ultimately can generate a new tumor. The mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway is associated with cancer stemness. However, its role in EC CSC-like populations needs to be elucidated. Here, we investigate the role of mTOR pathway on the stemness of a putative CSC-like population. Methods: Previously, we identified a putative CSC-like population (CD44+/CD24-) in EC cell lines and in tumor biopsy from EC patients. qPCR was used to measure the expression of mTOR in CD44+/CD24- CSC-like population of OE21 squamous cell carcinoma and OE33 adenocarcinoma cell lines compared to controls, that consisted of solid tumors generated from the same cell lines obtained from xenografts. mTOR inhibitors rapamycin and torin-1 were used to see their effect on CD44+/CD24- expression and sphere formation. Results: mTOR expression was 2-fold up-regulated in the OE33 CD44+/CD24- CSC-like population compared to control. Furthermore, in OE21 this up-regulation was 1.9-fold. Surprisingly, inhibiting the mTOR pathway with rapamycin enhanced OE33 CD44+/CD24- expression compared to its control (p = 0.01). In pilot experiments this effect was dose dependent and cells treated with rapamycin formed more spheres than control. Rapamycin did not alter the expression of CD44+/CD24- in OE21. Inhibiting the mTOR pathway with Torin-1 enhanced OE21 CD44+/CD24- expression by 1.2-fold compared to control (N = 2). In another pilot experiment Torin-1 treated cells were able to form more spheres compared to control. Torin-1 did not have an effect on the expression of CD44+/CD24- in OE33. Conclusions: These findings indicate that inhibiting the mTOR pathway may enhance CSC-like properties in EC. Additional research needs to be done to further support this hypothesis and elucidate the mechanism in this process. Furthermore, the effect of mTOR pathway inducers in EC needs to be explored.


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