scholarly journals The Use of ProteoTuner Technology to Study Nuclear Factor κB Activation by Heavy Ions

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (24) ◽  
pp. 13530
Author(s):  
Arif Ali Chishti ◽  
Christa Baumstark-Khan ◽  
Hasan Nisar ◽  
Yueyuan Hu ◽  
Bikash Konda ◽  
...  

Nuclear factor κB (NF-κB) activation might be central to heavy ion-induced detrimental processes such as cancer promotion and progression and sustained inflammatory responses. A sensitive detection system is crucial to better understand its involvement in these processes. Therefore, a DD-tdTomato fluorescent protein-based reporter system was previously constructed with human embryonic kidney (HEK) cells expressing DD-tdTomato as a reporter under the control of a promoter containing NF-κB binding sites (HEK-pNFκB-DD-tdTomato-C8). Using this reporter cell line, NF-κB activation after exposure to different energetic heavy ions (16O, 95 MeV/n, linear energy transfer—LET 51 keV/µm; 12C, 95 MeV/n, LET 73 keV/μm; 36Ar, 95 MeV/n, LET 272 keV/µm) was quantified considering the dose and number of heavy ions hits per cell nucleus that double NF-κB-dependent DD-tdTomato expression. Approximately 44 hits of 16O ions and ≈45 hits of 12C ions per cell nucleus were required to double the NF-κB-dependent DD-tdTomato expression, whereas only ≈3 hits of 36Ar ions were sufficient. In the presence of Shield-1, a synthetic molecule that stabilizes DD-tdTomato, even a single particle hit of 36Ar ions doubled NF-κB-dependent DD-tdTomato expression. In conclusion, stabilization of the reporter protein can increase the sensitivity for NF-κB activation detection by a factor of three, allowing the detection of single particle hits’ effects.

2012 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 531-537 ◽  
Author(s):  
Albert Braeuning ◽  
Silvia Vetter

Photinus pyralis (firefly) luciferase is widely used as a reporter system to monitor alterations in gene promoter and/or signalling pathway activities in vitro. The enzyme catalyses the formation of oxyluciferin from D-luciferin in an ATP-consuming reaction involving photon emission. The purpose of the present study was to characterize the luciferase-inhibiting potential of (E)-2-fluoro-4′-methoxystilbene, which is known as a potent inhibitor of the NF-κB (nuclear factor κB) signalling pathway that is used to modulate the NF-κB signalling pathway in vitro. Results show that (E)-2-fluoro-4′-methoxystilbene effectively inhibits firefly luciferase activity in cell lysates and living cells in a non-competitive manner with respect to the luciferase substrates D-luciferin and ATP. By contrast, the compound has no effect on Renilla and Gaussia luciferases. The mechanism of firefly luciferase inhibition by (E)-2-fluoro-4′-methoxystilbene, as well as its potency is comparable to its structure analogue resveratrol. The in vitro use of trans-stilbenes such as (E)-2-fluoro-4′-methoxystilbene or resveratrol compromises firefly luciferase reporter assays as well as ATP/luciferase-based cell viability assays.


2001 ◽  
Vol 152 (4) ◽  
pp. 753-764 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nguyen Truc Bui ◽  
Antonia Livolsi ◽  
Jean-Francois Peyron ◽  
Jochen H.M. Prehn

NGF has been shown to support neuron survival by activating the transcription factor nuclear factor-κB (NFκB). We investigated the effect of NGF on the expression of Bcl-xL, an anti–apoptotic Bcl-2 family protein. Treatment of rat pheochromocytoma PC12 cells, human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells, or primary rat hippocampal neurons with NGF (0.1–10 ng/ml) increased the expression of bcl-xL mRNA and protein. Reporter gene analysis revealed a significant increase in NFκB activity after treatment with NGF that was associated with increased nuclear translocation of the active NFκB p65 subunit. NGF-induced NFκB activity and Bcl-xL expression were inhibited in cells overexpressing the NFκB inhibitor, IκBα. Unlike tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), however, NGF-induced NFκB activation occurred without significant degradation of IκBs determined by Western blot analysis and time-lapse imaging of neurons expressing green fluorescent protein–tagged IκBα. Moreover, in contrast to TNF-α, NGF failed to phosphorylate IκBα at serine residue 32, but instead caused significant tyrosine phosphorylation. Overexpression of a Y42F mutant of IκBα potently suppressed NFG-, but not TNF-α–induced NFκB activation. Conversely, overexpression of a dominant negative mutant of TNF receptor-associated factor-6 blocked TNF-α–, but not NGF-induced NFκB activation. We conclude that NGF and TNF-α induce different signaling pathways in neurons to activate NFκB and bcl-x gene expression.


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