scholarly journals Combinatorial Effect of PLK1 Inhibition with Temozolomide and Radiation in Glioblastoma

Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (20) ◽  
pp. 5114
Author(s):  
Arvind Pandey ◽  
Satyendra C. Tripathi ◽  
Junhua Mai ◽  
Samir M. Hanash ◽  
Haifa Shen ◽  
...  

New strategies that improve median survivals of only ~15–20 months for glioblastoma (GBM) with the current standard of care (SOC) which is concurrent temozolomide (TMZ) and radiation (XRT) treatment are urgently needed. Inhibition of polo-like kinase 1 (PLK1), a multifunctional cell cycle regulator, overexpressed in GBM has shown therapeutic promise but has never been tested in the context of SOC. Therefore, we examined the mechanistic and therapeutic impact of PLK1 specific inhibitor (volasertib) alone and in combination with TMZ and/or XRT on GBM cells. We quantified the effects of volasertib alone and in combination with TMZ and/or XRT on GBM cell cytotoxicity/apoptosis, mitochondrial membrane potential (MtMP), reactive oxygen species (ROS), cell cycle, stemness, DNA damage, DNA repair genes, cellular signaling and in-vivo tumor growth. Volasertib alone and in combination with TMZ and/or XRT promoted apoptotic cell death, altered MtMP, increased ROS and G2/M cell cycle arrest. Combined volasertib and TMZ treatment reduced side population (SP) indicating activity against GBM stem-like cells. Volasertib combinatorial treatment also significantly increased DNA damage and reduced cell survival by inhibition of DNA repair gene expression and modulation of ERK/MAPK, AMPK and glucocorticoid receptor signaling. Finally, as observed in-vitro, combined volasertib and TMZ treatment resulted in synergistic inhibition of tumor growth in-vivo. Together these results identify new mechanisms of action for volasertib that provide a strong rationale for further investigation of PLK1 inhibition as an adjunct to current GBM SOC therapy.

2012 ◽  
Vol 30 (5_suppl) ◽  
pp. 106-106
Author(s):  
Robert Benjamin Den ◽  
Steve Ciment ◽  
Ankur Sharma ◽  
Hestia Mellert ◽  
Steven McMahon ◽  
...  

106 Background: Prostate cancer is the most frequently diagnosed malignancy and the second leading cause of cancer death in U.S. men. The retinoblastoma tumor suppressor protein, RB, plays a critical role in cell cycle regulation and loss of RB has been observed in 25-30% of prostate cancers. We have previously shown that RB loss results in a castrate resistant phenotype, however the consequences of RB status with regard to radiation response are unknown. We hypothesized that RB loss would downregulate the G1-S cell cycle checkpoint arrest normally induced by irradiation, inhibit DNA repair, and subsequently sensitize cells to ionizing radiation. Methods: Experimental work was performed with multiple isogenic prostate cancer cell lines (hormone sensitive: LNCaP and LAP-C4 cells and hormone resistant C42, 22Rv1 cells; stable knockdown of RB using shRNA). Gamma H2AX assays were used to quantitate DNA damage and PARP cleavage and Caspase 3 were used to quantitate apoptosis. FACS analysis with BrdU was used to assess the cell cycle. Cell survival was measured using the clonogenic cell survival assay. In vivo work was performed in nude mice with tumor xenografts. Results: We observed that loss of RB increased radioresponsiveness in both transient and clonogenic cell survival assays in both hormone sensitive and castrate resistant cell lines (p<0.05). Cell death was not mediated through increased apoptosis nor was perturbations in cell cycle noted. However, loss of RB effected DNA repair as measured by gamma H2AX staining as well as cellular senescence. In vivo xenografts of the RB deficient tumors exhibited diminished tumor mass, lower PSA kinetics and decreased tumor growth after treatment with single fraction of ionizing radiation in comparison to RB intact tumors (p<0.05). Conclusions: Loss of RB results in a differential response to ionizing radiation. Isogenic cells with RB knockdown are more sensitive to DNA damage and result in reduced cell survival. The underlying mechanism appears to be related to DNA damage repair and cellular senescence.


2016 ◽  
Vol 38 (5) ◽  
pp. 1897-1905 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chuanjie Yang ◽  
Quanxu Wang ◽  
Xiaodan Liu ◽  
Xiulian Cheng ◽  
Xiaoyu Jiang ◽  
...  

Objective: Radiation therapy, one of the major treatments for liver cancer, causes DNA damage and cell death. Since the liver cancer cells have a strong capacity to repair irradiative injury, new medicines to enhance this treatment are urgently required. In this study, we investigated the effect of NU7441, a synthetic small-molecule compound, as a specific inhibitor of DNA-dependent protein kinase (DNA-PK) in radiosensitization of hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells. Methods: Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) was first used to evaluate the proliferation of HepG2 cells under NU7441 treatment. SDS-PAGE and Western blot were then performed to study the protein expression leading to the DNA damage repair. Further, neutral single cell gel electrophoresis and immunofluorescence assay were carried out to assess DNA repair. Finally, flow cytometry was implemented to examine the changes in cell cycle. Results: NU7441 reduced the CCK-8 counts in the HepG2 culture, further enhanced 60Coγ radiation injury to HepG2 cells, which was manifested by decreasing the DNA-PKcs (S2056) protein expression, increasing γH2AX foci number, prolonging the tail moment of the comet cells, and inducing cell cycle arrest at G2/M phase. Conclusion: NU7441 inhibited the growth of liver cancer cells, enhanced the radiosensitization of these cancer cells by interfering with the DNA repair and cell cycle checkpoint. These data implicate NU7441 as a potential radiotherapy sensitizer for the treatment of liver cancer.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 4405
Author(s):  
Vladimir Bezrookove ◽  
John M. Patino ◽  
Mehdi Nosrati ◽  
Pierre-Yves Desprez ◽  
Sean McAllister ◽  
...  

Cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) is the second most common hepatobiliary cancer, an aggressive malignancy with limited therapeutic options. PARP (poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase) 1 and 2 are important for deoxyribonucleotide acid (DNA) repair and maintenance of genomic stability. PARP inhibitors (PARPi) such as niraparib have been approved for different malignancies with genomic alteration in germline BRCA and DNA damage response (DDR) pathway genes. Genomic alterations were analyzed in DDR genes in CCA samples employing The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database. Mutations were observed in various DDR genes, and 35.8% cases had alterations in at least one of three genes (ARID1A, BAP1 and ATM), suggesting their susceptibility to PARPi. Niraparib treatment suppressed cancer cell viability and survival, and also caused G2/M cell cycle arrest in patient-derived xenograft cells lines (PDXC) and established CCA cells harboring DDR gene mutations. PARPi treatment also induced apoptosis and caspase3/7 activity in PDXC and CCA cell lines, and substantially reduced expression of BCL2, BCL-XL and MCL1 proteins. Niraparib caused a significant increase in oxidative stress, and induced activation of DNA damage markers, phosphorylation of CHK2 and replication fork stalling. Importantly, niraparib, in combination with gemcitabine, produced sustained and robust inhibition of tumor growth in vivo in a patient-derived xenograft (PDX) model more effectively than either treatment alone. Furthermore, tissue samples from mice treated with niraparib and gemcitabine display significantly lower expression levels of pHH3 and Ki-67, which are a mitotic and proliferative marker, respectively. Taken together, our results indicate niraparib as a novel therapeutic agent alone or in combination with gemcitabine for CCA.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fang Zhang ◽  
Pengyi Yan ◽  
Huijing Yu ◽  
Huangying Le ◽  
Zixuan li ◽  
...  

SummaryAttenuated DNA repair leads to genomic instability and tumorigenesis. BRCA1/BARD1 are the best known tumor suppressors that promote homology recombination (HR) and arrest cell cycle at G2/M checkpoint. As E3 ubiquitin ligases, their ubiquitinase activity has been known to involve in the HR and tumor suppression, but the mechanism remains ambiguous. Here, we demonstrated upon genotoxic stress, BRCA1 together with BARD1 catalyzed the K48 ployubiquitination on LARP7, a 7SK RNA binding protein known to control RNAPII pausing, and thereby degraded it through 26S ubiquitin-proteasome pathway. Depleting LARP7 suppressed the expression of CDK1 complex, arrested cell at G2/M DNA damage checkpoint and reduced BRCA2 phosphorylation which thereby facilitated RAD51 recruitment to damaged DNA to enhance HR. Importantly, LARP7 depletion observed in breast patients lead to the chemoradiotherapy resistance both in vitro and in vivo. Together, this study unveils a mechanism by which BRCA1/BARD1 utilizes their E3 ligase activity to control HR and cell cycle, and highlights LARP7 as a potential target for cancer prevention and therapy.HighlightsDNA damage response downregulates LARP7 through BRCA1/BARD1BRCA1/BARD1 catalyzes the K48 polyubiquitination on LARP7LARP7 promotes G2/M cell cycle transition and tumorigenesis via CDK1 complexLARP7 disputes homology-directed repair that leads to tumor therapy resistance


2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (12) ◽  
pp. 1885-1897 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suozhi Qi ◽  
Brian R. Calvi

Apoptotic cell death is important for the normal development of a variety of organisms. Apoptosis is also a response to DNA damage and an important barrier to oncogenesis. The apoptotic response to DNA damage is dampened in specific cell types during development. Developmental signaling pathways can repress apoptosis, and reduced cell proliferation also correlates with a lower apoptotic response. However, because developmental signaling regulates both cell proliferation and apoptosis, the relative contribution of cell division to the apoptotic response has been hard to discern in vivo. Here we use Drosophila oogenesis as an in vivo model system to determine the extent to which cell proliferation influences the apoptotic response to DNA damage. We find that different types of cell cycle modifications are sufficient to repress the apoptotic response to ionizing radiation independent of developmental signaling. The step(s) at which the apoptosis pathway was repressed depended on the type of cell cycle modification—either upstream or downstream of expression of the p53-regulated proapoptotic genes. Our findings have important implications for understanding the coordination of cell proliferation with the apoptotic response in development and disease, including cancer and the tissue-specific responses to radiation therapy.


Molecules ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 1661-1675 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu-Rong Wang ◽  
Yuan Xu ◽  
Zhen-Zhou Jiang ◽  
Mounia Guerram ◽  
Bin Wang ◽  
...  

2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (5) ◽  
pp. 778-793 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiong Fu ◽  
Julia Chow ◽  
Kara A. Bernstein ◽  
Nodar Makharashvili ◽  
Sucheta Arora ◽  
...  

In the DNA damage response, many repair and signaling molecules mobilize rapidly at the sites of DNA double-strand breaks. This network of immediate responses is regulated at the level of posttranslational modifications that control the activation of DNA processing enzymes, protein kinases, and scaffold proteins to coordinate DNA repair and checkpoint signaling. Here we investigated the DNA damage-induced oligomeric transitions of the Sae2 protein, an important enzyme in the initiation of DNA double-strand break repair. Sae2 is a target of multiple phosphorylation events, which we identified and characterizedin vivoin the budding yeastSaccharomyces cerevisiae. Both cell cycle-dependent and DNA damage-dependent phosphorylation sites in Sae2 are important for the survival of DNA damage, and the cell cycle-regulated modifications are required to prime the damage-dependent events. We found that Sae2 exists in the form of inactive oligomers that are transiently released into smaller active units by this series of phosphorylations. DNA damage also triggers removal of Sae2 through autophagy and proteasomal degradation, ensuring that active Sae2 is present only transiently in cells. Overall, this analysis provides evidence for a novel type of protein regulation where the activity of an enzyme is controlled dynamically by posttranslational modifications that regulate its solubility and oligomeric state.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shuang Yan ◽  
Man Song ◽  
Jie Ping ◽  
Shu-ting Lai ◽  
Xiao-yu Cao ◽  
...  

AbstractTo maintain genomic stability, the mammalian cells has evolved a coordinated response to DNA damage, including activation of DNA repair and cell cycle checkpoint processes. Exonuclease 1 (EXO1)-dependent excision of DNA ends is important for the initiation of homologous recombination (HR) repair of DNA breaks, which is thought to play a key role in activating the ATR-CHK1 pathway to induce G2/M cell cycle arrest. But the mechanism is still not fully understood. Here, we report that ZGRF1 forms complexes with EXO1 as well as other repair proteins and promotes DNA repair through HR. ZGRF1 is recruited to DNA damage sites in a MDC1-RNF8-BRCA1 dependent manner. Furthermore, ZGRF1 is important for the recruitment of RPA2 to DNA damage sites and the following ATR-CHK1 mediated G2/M checkpoint in response to irradiation. ZGRF1 null cells show increased sensitivity to many DNA-damaging agents, especially PARPi and irradiation. Collectively,our findings identify ZGRF1 as a novel regulator of DNA end resection and G2/M checkpoint. ZGRF1 is a potential target of radiation and PARPi cancer therapy.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rovingaile Kriska Ponce ◽  
Nicholas J Thomas ◽  
Nam Q Bui ◽  
Tadashi Kondo ◽  
Ross A Okimoto

CIC-DUX4 rearrangements define an aggressive and chemotherapy-insensitive subset of undifferentiated sarcomas. The CIC-DUX4 fusion drives oncogenesis through direct transcriptional upregulation of cell cycle and DNA replication genes. Notably, CIC-DUX4-mediated CCNE1 upregulation compromises the G1/S transition, conferring a potential survival dependence on the G2/M cell cycle checkpoint. Through an integrative transcriptional and kinase activity screen using patient-derived specimens, we now show that CIC-DUX4 sarcomas depend on the G2/M checkpoint regulator, WEE1, as an adaptive survival mechanism. Specifically, CIC-DUX4 sarcomas depend on WEE1 activity to limit DNA damage and unscheduled mitotic entry. Consequently, genetic or pharmacologic WEE1 inhibition in vitro and in vivo leads to rapid DNA damage-associated apoptotic induction of patient-derived CIC-DUX4 sarcomas. Thus, we identify WEE1 as an actionable therapeutic vulnerability in CIC-DUX4 sarcomas.


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