Project description:Paretal KM12 and NTRK inhibitor resistant cells established from KM12 in our laboratory was compared to search for and analyze significant factors related to resistance mechanism. To investigated the mechanism of resistance to NTRK-TKI, we establish resistant cells to three type NTRK-TKIs (Larotrectinib, Entrectinib and Selitrectinib) by step -wise methods using KM12 with TPM5-NTRK1 rearrangement for 6 months. (KM12-LR, KM12-ER and KM12-SR) 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl-CoA synthase 2 (HMGCS2) over expression was observed commonly in three resistance cells. Lower expression of SREBP2 and PPARα in two cells (KM12-ER and KM12-SR) in which HMGCS2 was more overexpressed than parental KM12 and KM12-LR. In resistant cells, knockdown of HMGCS2 using small interfering RNA improved NTRK-TKIs sensitivity, but further treatment with mevalonolactone after knockdown HMGCS2 reintroduced NTRK-TKIs resistance. In addition, simvastatin and silibinin had synergic effect with NTRK-TKIs to resistant cells and delayed tolerance was observed after sustained exposure to clinical concentrations of NTRK-TKI and simvastatin against KM12. These results suggested that HMGCS2 overexpression induces resistance to NTRK-TKI via the mevalonate pathway. In addition, statin inhibited mevalonate pathway may be useful for overcoming this mechanism resistance.
Project description:Re-induction of endogenous proliferation is a promising regeneration strategy for post-mitotic organs. For heart regeneration, we recently discovered that dual inhibition of both GSK3 and MST1 is required for proliferation in mature human cardiac organoids1. However, the mechanisms of action are not yet understood. Here, we de-convolute the mitogenic response using proteomics and report that GSK3 inhibition activates a cell cycle network whereas MST1 inhibition drives the mevalonate pathway. Screening of an additional 105 compounds identified a p38 inhibitor, which activated a cell cycle network, as well as an inhibitor of TGFBR, which activated the mevalonate pathway; combinatorial treatment with these two inhibitors also resulted in synergistic cell cycle activation. The mevalonate pathway which was consistently activated under the most robust proliferative conditions, is down-regulated during in vivo maturation when cardiomyocyte regenerative capacity ceases and inhibition of the mevalonate pathway abolished the myocyte proliferative response to mitogens. Taken together, our findings suggest that the mevalonate pathway synergises with mitogenic agents to enable mature cardiomyocytes to re-enter the cell cycle. These findings have important ramifications for development of cardiac regenerative therapeutics.
Project description:Metastasis is an important factor affecting the prognosis and survival of bladder cancer (BLCA) patients. Our previous study found that the mevalonate pathway is associated with the migratory ability of BLCA cells, but the exact mechanism is unclear. Here, we found that BLCA patients with mevalonate pathway activation had a poorer prognosis. Inhibition of the mevalonate pathway (FDPS knockdown, simvastatin or zoledronic acid) significantly reduced the migratory ability of BLCA cells. Therefore, we tested the changes of key genes after knocking down the key enzymes of the mevalonate pathway, FDPS and SQLE1, and the transcription factor YY1 in bladder cancer cells using RNA sequencing.
Project description:Mitochondrial dysfunction induces a strong adaptive retrograde signaling response, however many of the down-stream effectors remain to be discovered. Here, we studied the shared transcriptional responses to three different mitochondrial respiratory chain inhibitors in human primary skin fibroblasts using QuantSeq 3’RNA-sequencing. We found that mevalonate pathway genes were concurrently downregulated irrespective of the respiratory chain complex affected. Targeted metabolomics demonstrated that impaired mitochondrial respiration at any of the three affected complexes also had functional consequences on the mevalonate pathway, reducing cholesterol precursor metabolites. A deeper study of complex I inhibition showed a reduced activity of ER-bound sterol sensing enzymes through impaired processing of the transcription factor SREBP2 and accelerated degradation of the ER cholesterol sensors SQLE and HMGCR. These adaptations of mevalonate pathway activity neither affected total intracellular cholesterol levels nor the cellular free (non-esterified) cholesterol pool. Measurement of intracellular cholesterol using the fluorescent cholesterol binding dye filipin revealed that complex I inhibition elevated cholesterol on intracellular compartments. Our study shows that mitochondrial respiratory chain dysfunction elevates intracellular free cholesterol levels and therefore attenuates the expression of mevalonate pathway enzymes, which lowers endogenous cholesterol biosynthesis, disrupting the metabolic output of the mevalonate pathway. Intracellular disturbances in cholesterol homeostasis may alter systemic cholesterol management in diseases associated with declining mitochondrial function.
Project description:Simvastatin has been widely used for treatment of hypercholesterolemia due to its ability to inhibit HMG-CoA reductase, the rate limiting enzyme of de novo cholesterol synthesis via mevalonate pathway. Its inhibitory action causes also depletion of pathway intermediates, farnesyl pyrophosphate (FPP) and geranyl-geranyl pyrophosphate (GGPP), which are inevitable for proper targeting of small GTPases (e.g. Ras proteins) to their site of action. We profiled by array the gene expression of MIA PaCa-2 cells treated with simvastatin, FPP, GGPP and their combinations. The inhibitory effect of statins on GFP-K-Ras protein trafficking were partially prevented by addition of the mevalonate pathway intermediates. We conclude that the anticancer effect of simvastatin is to a large extent mediated through isoprenoid intermediates of the mevalonate pathway.
Project description:Isoprenoids are a class of ubiquitous organic molecules synthesized from the five-carbon starter unit isopentenyl pyrophosphate (IPP). Comprising more than 30,000 known natural products, isoprenoids serve various important biological functions in many organisms. In bacteria, undecaprenyl pyrophosphate is absolutely required for the formation of cell wall peptidoglycan and other cell surface structures, while ubiquinones and menaquinones, both containing an essential prenyl moiety, are key electron carriers in respiratory energy generation. There is scant knowledge on the nature and regulation of bacterial isoprenoid pathways. In order to explore the cellular responses to perturbations in the mevalonate pathway, responsible for producing the isoprenoid precursor IPP in many Gram-positive bacteria and eukaryotes, we constructed three strains of Staphylococcus aureus in which each of the mevalonate pathway genes is regulated by an IPTG inducible promoter. We used DNA microarrays to profile the transcriptional effects of downregulating the components of the mevalonate pathway in S. aureus and demonstrate that decreased expression of the mevalonate pathway leads to widespread downregulation of primary metabolism genes, an upregulation in virulence factors and cell wall biosynthetic determinants, and surprisingly little compensatory expression in other isoprenoid biosynthetic genes. We subsequently correlate these transcriptional changes with downstream metabolic consequences. We used microarrays to profile the transcriptional changes incurred when downregulating mvaS, mvaA, or mvaK in S. aureus. Keywords: stress response S. aureus mutants were generated in which mvaS, mvaA, or mvaK were placed under control of the IPTG-inducible Pspac promoter. These mutants, as well as wildtype RN4220 S. aureus, were grown with or without 1 mM IPTG, harvested in exponential phase, and their total RNA was extracted and hybridized to Affymetrix GeneChips. Experiments were done in triplicate.
Project description:Purpose: Induction of endogenous proliferation is a promising strategy for cardiac regeneration. We find that GSK3 inhibition activates a cell cycle network whereas MST1 inhibition drives the mevalonate pathway, with synergistic activation of proliferation. However, all GSK3 inhibitors tested also reduce contractile force in hCO. We screened for small molecule activators of cardiomyocyte proliferation that did not alter contractile force in hCOs. This was overcome by screening of a boutique compound library, identifying a p38 inhibitor, which activated a cell cycle network without reducing force. The screen also identified a TGFBR inhibitor that induces the mevalonate pathway and can also synergise to activate proliferation. RNA sequencing was performed to investigate underlying mechanisms of action. Methods: RNA samples were processed with Illumina TruSeq Stranded mRNA Library prep kit selecting for poly(A) taled RNA following the manufacturer’s recommendations. Libraries were quantified with Qubit HS (ThermoFisher) and Fragment Analyzer (Advances Analytical Technologies) adjusted to the appropriate concentration for sequencing. Indexed libraries were pooled and sequenced at a final concentration of 1.8 pM on an Illumina NextSeq 500 high-output run using paired-end chemistry with 75 bp read length. The sequencing data was demultiplexed using Illumina bcl2fastq2-v2.17. The quality of the reads was assessed thanks to FastQC. The reads were then processed and mapped to the human genome hg38 using the Bcbio-nextgen framework version 1.0.3. The aligner used was HISAT2 2.0.5. Raw counts were normalised and analysed with DESeq2. Results: Analysis of RNAseq data lead to the understanding that compound 3 regulated the cell cycle network, which was similar to GSK3 inhibitors, whereas compound 65 regulated the mevalonate network, which was similarly to MST1 inhibitors. Conclusions: The current study adds to a growing body of evidence that alterations in cardiomyocyte metabolism may be a cause rather than a consequence of cardiomyocyte cell cycle arrest. Controlling cellular metabolism is emerging as a key strategy in the fight against cancer but the same pathways may conversely be required for the development of cardiac regenerative therapies.
Project description:We have discovered that loss of wild-type p53 correlates with elevated expression of mevalonate pathway genes in murine liver cancer and in human tumors. Mechanistically p53 blocks activation of SREBP-2, the master transcriptional regulator of this pathway, by transcriptionally inducing the ABCA1 cholesterol transporter gene, which inhibits SREBP-2 maturation. In mice the increase in mevalonate gene expression occurs in premalignant p53-null hepatocytes at a stage when p53 is needed to actively suppress tumorigenesis. Either RNAi mediated suppression of key genes in the mevalonate pathway or pharmacological inhibition of its rate-limiting enzyme restricts the development of mouse hepatocellular carcinomas driven by p53 loss. Conversely, like p53 loss, ablation of ABCA1 promotes tumorigenesis in a murine model and is associated with increased SREBP-2 maturation. Our findings thereby demonstrate that repression of the mevalonate pathway is a crucial component of p53-mediated tumor suppression and outline the mechanism by which this occurs.
Project description:Metastasis is an important factor affecting the prognosis and survival of bladder cancer (BLCA) patients. Our previous study found that the mevalonate pathway is associated with the migratory ability of bladder cancer cells, but the exact mechanism is unclear. Here, we found that BLCA patients with mevalonate pathway activation had a poorer prognosis. Inhibition of the mevalonate pathway (simvastatin or zoledronic acid) resulted in a significant decrease in the migratory ability of BLCA cells. Therefore, we used proteomics to detect simvastatin- or zoledronic acid-treated BLCA cells to explore the effect of the mevalonate pathway on key proteins in BLCA cells.
Project description:Isoprenoids are a class of ubiquitous organic molecules synthesized from the five-carbon starter unit isopentenyl pyrophosphate (IPP). Comprising more than 30,000 known natural products, isoprenoids serve various important biological functions in many organisms. In bacteria, undecaprenyl pyrophosphate is absolutely required for the formation of cell wall peptidoglycan and other cell surface structures, while ubiquinones and menaquinones, both containing an essential prenyl moiety, are key electron carriers in respiratory energy generation. There is scant knowledge on the nature and regulation of bacterial isoprenoid pathways. In order to explore the cellular responses to perturbations in the mevalonate pathway, responsible for producing the isoprenoid precursor IPP in many Gram-positive bacteria and eukaryotes, we constructed three strains of Staphylococcus aureus in which each of the mevalonate pathway genes is regulated by an IPTG inducible promoter. We used DNA microarrays to profile the transcriptional effects of downregulating the components of the mevalonate pathway in S. aureus and demonstrate that decreased expression of the mevalonate pathway leads to widespread downregulation of primary metabolism genes, an upregulation in virulence factors and cell wall biosynthetic determinants, and surprisingly little compensatory expression in other isoprenoid biosynthetic genes. We subsequently correlate these transcriptional changes with downstream metabolic consequences. We used microarrays to profile the transcriptional changes incurred when downregulating mvaS, mvaA, or mvaK in S. aureus. Keywords: stress response