Dataset Information

Isoleucine 44 Hydrophobic Patch Controls Toxicity of Unanchored, Linear Ubiquitin Chains through NF-?B Signaling.

ABSTRACT: Ubiquitination is a post-translational modification that regulates cellular processes by altering the interactions of proteins to which ubiquitin, a small protein adduct, is conjugated. Ubiquitination yields various products, including mono- and poly-ubiquitinated substrates, as well as unanchored poly-ubiquitin chains whose accumulation is considered toxic. We previously showed that transgenic, unanchored poly-ubiquitin is not problematic in Drosophila melanogaster. In the fruit fly, free chains exist in various lengths and topologies and are degraded by the proteasome; they are also conjugated onto other proteins as one unit, eliminating them from the free ubiquitin chain pool. Here, to further explore the notion of unanchored chain toxicity, we examined when free poly-ubiquitin might become problematic. We found that unanchored chains can be highly toxic if they resemble linear poly-ubiquitin that cannot be modified into other topologies. These species upregulate NF-?B signaling, and modulation of the levels of NF-?B components reduces toxicity. In additional studies, we show that toxicity from untethered, linear chains is regulated by isoleucine 44, which anchors a key interaction site for ubiquitin. We conclude that free ubiquitin chains can be toxic, but only in uncommon circumstances, such as when the ability of cells to modify and regulate them is markedly restricted.

SUBMITTER: Blount JR

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7348737 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Isoleucine 44 Hydrophobic Patch Controls Toxicity of Unanchored, Linear Ubiquitin Chains through NF-κB Signaling.

Blount Jessica R JR Libohova Kozeta K Silva Gustavo M GM Todi Sokol V SV

Cells 20200622 6

Ubiquitination is a post-translational modification that regulates cellular processes by altering the interactions of proteins to which ubiquitin, a small protein adduct, is conjugated. Ubiquitination yields various products, including mono- and poly-ubiquitinated substrates, as well as unanchored poly-ubiquitin chains whose accumulation is considered toxic. We previously showed that transgenic, unanchored poly-ubiquitin is not problematic in <i>Drosophila melanogaster</i>. In the fruit fly, fre ...[more]

PMID: 32580388

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Project description:Post-translational control by ubiquitin regulates various aspects of cellular biology. This chemical modification on proteins presents itself in numerous iterations, from a single mono-ubiquitination event to chains of poly-ubiquitin. Among the various types of poly-ubiquitin constructed are untethered species that comprise a series of ubiquitin moieties linked to one another, but free from another protein. The current notion is that these unanchored poly-ubiquitin species are deleterious to the cell and are rapidly deconstructed. We recently examined the toxicity and utilization of untethered poly-ubiquitin in an intact organism by using the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. We found that these ubiquitin species are largely innocuous to flies and that free poly-Ub can be controlled by being degraded by the proteasome or being conjugated onto another protein as a single unit. However, whether the fly is mounting an organismal defense against untethered chains was not explored in detail. Here, we conducted RNA-seq analyses to examine at the transcriptome level the impact of unanchored poly-Ub in the fly. We found ~90 transcripts whose expression is altered in the presence of different types of unanchored poly-ubiquitin. The set of genes identified was mostly devoid of ubiquitin-, proteasome- or autophagy-related components. The largest gene ontology category identified, housing ~15 of the altered genes, was proteolysis. The seeming absence of a large and multipronged response to unanchored ubiquitin chains in the fly supports the conclusion that these species need not be toxic in vivo and underscores the need to reexamine the role of free ubiquitin chains in the cell. We designed two types of poly-Ub chains with six Ub molecules in tandem. They cannot be cleaved by DUBs (there are no "GG" motifs linking the Ub molecules). Ub6-GG can be conjugated in toto onto other proteins; Ub6-Stop cannot. We drove ubiquitous expression using sqh-Gal4, and then performed RNA-Seq on adult flies to determine any cellular response to the presence of our unanchored Ub chains.

Dataset Information

Isoleucine 44 Hydrophobic Patch Controls Toxicity of Unanchored, Linear Ubiquitin Chains through NF-?B Signaling.

Publications

Isoleucine 44 Hydrophobic Patch Controls Toxicity of Unanchored, Linear Ubiquitin Chains through NF-κB Signaling.

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