scholarly journals Functional Linkage of RKIP to the Epithelial to Mesenchymal Transition and Autophagy during the Development of Prostate Cancer

Cancers ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 273 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mahmoud Ahmed ◽  
Trang Lai ◽  
Sahib Zada ◽  
Jin Hwang ◽  
Trang Pham ◽  
...  

Raf kinase inhibitor protein (RKIP) plays a critical role in many signaling pathways as a multi-functional adapter protein. In particular, the loss of RKIP’s function in certain types of cancer cells results in epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) and the promotion of cancer metastasis. In addition, RKIP inhibits autophagy by modulating LC3-lipidation and mTORC1. How the RKIP-dependent inhibition of autophagy is linked to EMT and cancer progression is still under investigation. In this study, we investigated the ways by which RKIP interacts with key gene products in EMT and autophagy during the progression of prostate cancer. We first identified the gene products of interest using the corresponding gene ontology terms. The weighted-gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) was applied on a gene expression dataset from three groups of prostate tissues; benign prostate hyperplasia, primary and metastatic cancer. We found two modules of highly co-expressed genes, which were preserved in other independent datasets of prostate cancer tissues. RKIP showed potentially novel interactions with one EMT and seven autophagy gene products (TGFBR1; PIK3C3, PIK3CB, TBC1D25, TBC1D5, TOLLIP, WDR45 and WIPI1). In addition, we identified several upstream transcription modulators that could regulate the expression of these gene products. Finally, we verified some RKIP novel interactions by co-localization using the confocal microscopy analysis in a prostate cancer cell line. To summarize, RKIP interacts with EMT and autophagy as part of the same functional unit in developing prostate cancer.

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Divya Adiga ◽  
Raghu Radhakrishnan ◽  
Sanjiban Chakrabarty ◽  
Prashant Kumar ◽  
Shama Prasada Kabekkodu

Despite substantial advances in the field of cancer therapeutics, metastasis is a significant challenge for a favorable clinical outcome. Epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a process of acquiring increased motility, invasiveness, and therapeutic resistance by cancer cells for their sustained growth and survival. A plethora of intrinsic mechanisms and extrinsic microenvironmental factors drive the process of cancer metastasis. Calcium (Ca<sup>2+</sup>) signaling plays a critical role in dictating the adaptive metastatic cell behavior comprising of cell migration, invasion, angiogenesis, and intravasation. By modulating EMT, Ca<sup>2+</sup> signaling can regulate the complexity and dynamics of events leading to metastasis. This review summarizes the role of Ca<sup>2+</sup> signal remodeling in the regulation of EMT and metastasis in cancer.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina Xue ◽  
Tingting Du ◽  
Fangfang Lai ◽  
Jing Jin ◽  
Ming Ji ◽  
...  

Abstract Extracellular heat shock protein 90α (HSP90α) has been reported to promote cancer cell invasion and migration. However, whether pancreatic cancer (PC) cells expressed membrane-bound or secreted HSP90α and its underlying mechanism for PC progression were still unclear. Our study pointed out that highly invasive Capan2 cells has a higher level of secreted HSP90α, rather than membrane HSP90α, compared with those of less invasive PL45 cells. The conditioned medium of Capan2 cells or recombinant HSP90α protein was able to stimulate the migration and invasion of PL45 or capan2 cells, which could be prevented by a neutralizing anti-HSP90α antibody. Furthermore, secreted HSP90α promoted elements of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in PL45 cells, including increases in vimentin and snail expressions, decreases in E-cadherin expression and changes in cell shape towards a mesenchymal phenotype, but these phenomena were reversed by anti-HSP90α antibody in Capan2 cells. In addition, high levels of low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 1 (LRP1) mRNA were associated with worsened patient survival in pancreatic adenocarcinoma. LRP1 as a receptor of eHSP90α for its stimulatory role of PC cells EMT and metastasis by activating AKT signaling. Down-regulation of LRP1 could promote chemosensitivity to gemcitabine and doxorubicin, but not to topotecan and paclitaxel in Capan2 cells. Therefore, our study reveals a critical role of secreted HSP90α on EMT events and suggests blocking secreted HSP90α underlies an aspect of metastasis and chemoresistance.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (11) ◽  
pp. e0259462
Author(s):  
Remy Elbez ◽  
Jeff Folz ◽  
Alan McLean ◽  
Hernan Roca ◽  
Joseph M. Labuz ◽  
...  

We define cell morphodynamics as the cell’s time dependent morphology. It could be called the cell’s shape shifting ability. To measure it we use a biomarker free, dynamic histology method, which is based on multiplexed Cell Magneto-Rotation and Machine Learning. We note that standard studies looking at cells immobilized on microscope slides cannot reveal their shape shifting, no more than pinned butterfly collections can reveal their flight patterns. Using cell magnetorotation, with the aid of cell embedded magnetic nanoparticles, our method allows each cell to move freely in 3 dimensions, with a rapid following of cell deformations in all 3-dimensions, so as to identify and classify a cell by its dynamic morphology. Using object recognition and machine learning algorithms, we continuously measure the real-time shape dynamics of each cell, where from we successfully resolve the inherent broad heterogeneity of the morphological phenotypes found in a given cancer cell population. In three illustrative experiments we have achieved clustering, differentiation, and identification of cells from (A) two distinct cell lines, (B) cells having gone through the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition, and (C) cells differing only by their motility. This microfluidic method may enable a fast screening and identification of invasive cells, e.g., metastatic cancer cells, even in the absence of biomarkers, thus providing a rapid diagnostics and assessment protocol for effective personalized cancer therapy.


Author(s):  
Samriddhi Arora ◽  
Jyoti Tanwar ◽  
Nutan Sharma ◽  
Suman Saurav ◽  
Rajender K. Motiani

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is one of the most lethal forms of cancers with 5-year mean survival rate of less than 10%. Most of the PC associated deaths are due to metastasis to secondary sites. Calcium (Ca2+) signaling plays a critical role in regulating hallmarks of cancer progression including cell proliferation, migration and apoptotic resistance. Store operated Ca2+ entry (SOCE) mediated by Orai1/2/3 channels is a highly regulated and ubiquitous pathway responsible for Ca2+ influx into non-excitable cells. In this study, we performed extensive bioinformatic analysis of publicly available datasets and observed that Orai3 expression is inversely associated with the mean survival time of PC patients. Orai3 expression analysis in a battery of PC cell lines corroborated its differential expression profile. We then carried out thorough Ca2+ imaging experiments in 6 PC cell lines and found that Orai3 forms a functional SOCE in PC cells. Our in vitro functional assays show that Orai3 regulates PC cell cycle progression, apoptosis and migration. Most importantly, our in vivo xenograft studies demonstrate a critical role of Orai3 in PC tumor growth and secondary metastasis. Mechanistically, Orai3 controls G1 phase progression, matrix metalloproteinase expression and epithelial-mesenchymal transition in PC cells. Taken together, this study for the first time reports that Orai3 drives aggressive phenotypes of PC cells i.e. migration in vitro and metastasis in vivo. Considering that Orai3 expression is inversely associated with the PC patients survival time, it appears to be a highly attractive therapeutic target.


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jing Huang ◽  
Siyuan Chang ◽  
Yabin Lu ◽  
Jing Wang ◽  
Yang Si ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Increased cell mobility is a signature when tumor cells undergo epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition. TGF-β is a key stimulating factor to promote the transcription of a variety of downstream genes to accelerate cancer progression and metastasis, including osteopontin (OPN) which exists in several functional forms as different splicing variants. In non-small cell lung cancer cells, although increased total OPN expression was observed under various EMT conditions, the exact constitution and the underlining mechanism towards the generation of such OPN splicing isoforms was poorly understood. Methods We investigated the possible mechanisms of osteopontin splicing variant and its role in EMT and cancer metastasis using NSCLC cell line and cell and molecular biology techniques. Results In this study, we determined that OPNc, an exon 4 excluded shorter form of Opn gene products, appeared to be more potent to promote cell invasion. The expression of OPNc was selectively increased to higher abundance during EMT following TGF-β induction. The switching from OPNa to OPNc could be enhanced by RUNX2 (a transcription factor that recognizes the Opn gene promoter) overexpression, but appeared to be strictly in a HDAC dependent manner in A549 cells. The results suggested the increase of minor splicing variant of OPNc required both (1) the enhanced transcription from its coding gene driven by specific transcription factors; and (2) the simultaneous modulation or fluctuation of the coupled splicing process that depends to selective classed of epigenetic regulators, predominately HDAC family members. Conclusion Our study not only emphasized the importance of splicing variant for its role in EMT and cancer metastasis, but also helped to understand the possible mechanisms of the epigenetic controls for defining the levels and kinetic of gene splicing isoforms and their generations.


Cells ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sahib Zada ◽  
Jin Hwang ◽  
Mahmoud Ahmed ◽  
Trang Lai ◽  
Trang Pham ◽  
...  

Autophagy, an intracellular degradation process, is essential for maintaining cell homeostasis by removing damaged organelles and proteins under various conditions of stress. In cancer, autophagy has conflicting functions. It plays a key role in protecting against cancerous transformation by maintaining genomic stability against genotoxic components, leading to cancerous transformation. It can also promote cancer cell survival by supplying minimal amounts of nutrients during cancer progression. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying how autophagy regulates the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and cancer metastasis are unknown. Here, we show that starvation-induced autophagy promotes Snail (SNAI1) degradation and inhibits EMT and metastasis in cancer cells. Interestingly, SNAI1 proteins were physically associated and colocalized with LC3 and SQSTM1 in cancer cells. We also found a significant decrease in the levels of EMT and metastatic proteins under starvation conditions. Furthermore, ATG7 knockdown inhibited autophagy-induced SNAI1 degradation in the cytoplasm, which was associated with a decrease in SNAI1 nuclear translocation. Moreover, cancer cell invasion and migration were significantly inhibited by starvation-induced autophagy. These findings suggest that autophagy-dependent SNAI1 degradation could specifically regulate EMT and cancer metastasis during tumorigenesis.


Author(s):  
Victor K. Lin ◽  
Shih-Ya Wang ◽  
Lanxiao Wu ◽  
Smitha M. Rao ◽  
J. C. Chiao ◽  
...  

Epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) has been believed to play a critical role in cancer metastasis. TGFβ has been described as an inducer of EMT in normal mammary epithelial cells by signaling through receptor serine/threonine kinase pathways to regulate epithelial cell plasticity and invasion. In this study, we investigated the EMT cellular responses, including morphologic changes, phenotype switches, invasiveness enhancement, and cellular contraction alteration, in TGFβ stimulated human prostate normal epithelial cells (PZ-HPV-7). Migration of TGFβ treated PZ-HPV-7 cells across matrigel was measured in invasion chambers (8 μm pore size). The cells were treated with or without TGFβ (2 ng/ml) in PrEGM media for 3 days. Immunoblot assay was conducted and it was demonstrated that the induction of vimentin when stimulated by TGFβ was accompanied by a downregulation of E-cadherin, though p-cadherin level was not altered. It was also observed that there was a decrease in cytokaretin 5/6 expression associated with the downregulation of E-cadherin during the induction of EMT. In order to study the cell contraction, three-dimensional collage lattice assay was performed. It was demonstrated that TGFβ-stimulated PZ-HPV-7 cells gained contractility. Our results showed that TGFβ stimulation induced PZ-HPV-7 cells to undergo epithelial to mesenchymal transition. EMT characteristics such as acquisition of mesenchymal markers and loss of epithelial markers were evident in the induction of vimentin and downregulation of E-cadherin and cytokeratins, as well as phenotypic alterations including increased contraction and enhanced mobility were detected.


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