EphA3 biology and cancer.

Eph receptor tyrosine kinases control cell-cell interactions during normal and oncogenic development, and are implicated in a range of processes including angiogenesis, stem cell maintenance and metastasis. They are thus of great interest as targets for cancer therapy. EphA3, originally isolated from leukemic and melanoma cells, is presently one of the most promising therapeutic targets, with multiple tumor-promoting roles in a variety of cancer types. This review focuses on EphA3, its functions in controlling cellular behavior, both in normal and pathological development, and most particularly in cancer.

Inhibition of apoptosis by BCL2 prevents leukemic transformation of a murine myelodysplastic syndrome.

Programmed cell death or apoptosis is a prominent feature of low-risk myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), although the underlying mechanism remains controversial. High-risk MDS have less apoptosis associated with increased expression of the prosurvival BCL2-related proteins. To address the mechanism and pathogenic role of apoptosis and BCL2 expression in MDS, we used a mouse model resembling human MDS, in which the fusion protein NUP98-HOXD13 (NHD13) of the chromosomal translocation t(2;11)(q31;p15) is expressed in hematopoietic cells. Hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells from 3-month-old mice had increased rates of apoptosis associated with increased cell cycling and DNA damage. Gene expression profiling of these MDS progenitors revealed a specific reduction in Bcl2. Restoration of Bcl2 expression by a BCL2 transgene blocked apoptosis of the MDS progenitors, which corrected the macrocytic anemia. Blocking apoptosis also restored cell-cycle quiescence and reduced DNA damage in the MDS progenitors. We expected that preventing apoptosis would accelerate malignant transformation to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). However, contrary to expectations, preventing apoptosis of premalignant cells abrogated transformation to AML. In contrast to the current dogma that overcoming apoptosis is an important step toward cancer, this work demonstrates that gaining a survival advantage of premalignant cells may delay or prevent leukemic progression.

NUP98 gene fusions and hematopoietic malignancies: common themes and new biologic insights.

Structural chromosomal rearrangements of the Nucleoporin 98 gene (NUP98), primarily balanced translocations and inversions, are associated with a wide array of hematopoietic malignancies. NUP98 is known to be fused to at least 28 different partner genes in patients with hematopoietic malignancies, including acute myeloid leukemia, chronic myeloid leukemia in blast crisis, myelodysplastic syndrome, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and bilineage/biphenotypic leukemia. NUP98 gene fusions typically encode a fusion protein that retains the amino terminus of NUP98; in this context, it is important to note that several recent studies have demonstrated that the amino-terminal portion of NUP98 exhibits transcription activation potential. Approximately half of the NUP98 fusion partners encode homeodomain proteins, and at least 5 NUP98 fusions involve known histone-modifying genes. Several of the NUP98 fusions, including NUP98-homeobox (HOX)A9, NUP98-HOXD13, and NUP98-JARID1A, have been used to generate animal models of both lymphoid and myeloid malignancy; these models typically up-regulate HOXA cluster genes, including HOXA5, HOXA7, HOXA9, and HOXA10. In addition, several of the NUP98 fusion proteins have been shown to inhibit differentiation of hematopoietic precursors and to increase self-renewal of hematopoietic stem or progenitor cells, providing a potential mechanism for malignant transformation.

Pre-Leukemic States: United by Difference.

Pre-leukemia is a catch-all term for any haematological condition which predisposes the individual towards developing leukemia [...].

Cell-Extrinsic Differentiation Block Mediated by EphA3 in Pre-Leukaemic Thymus Contributes to Disease Progression.

We recently characterised the NUP98-HOXD13 (NHD13) mouse as a model of T-cell pre-leukaemia, featuring thymocytes that can engraft in recipient animals and progress to T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (T-ALL). However, loss of this engraftment ability by deletion of Lyl1 did not result in any loss of leukemogenesis activity. In the present study, we observe that NHD13 thymocytes overexpress EPHA3, and we characterise thymocyte behaviour in NHD13 mice with deletion of EphA3, which show a markedly reduced incidence of T-ALL. Deletion of EphA3 from the NHD13 mice does not prevent the abnormal accumulation or transplantation ability of these thymocytes. However, upon transplantation, these cells are unable to block the normal progression of recipient wild type (WT) progenitor cells through the normal developmental pathway. This is in contrast to the EphA3+/+ NHD13 thymocytes, which block the progression of incoming WT progenitors past the DN1 stage. Therefore, EphA3 is not critical for classical self-renewal, but is essential for mediating an interaction between the abnormally self-renewing cells and healthy progenitors-an interaction that results in a failure of the healthy cells to differentiate normally. We speculate that this may orchestrate a loss of healthy cell competition, which in itself has been demonstrated to be oncogenic, and that this may explain the decrease in T-ALL incidence in the absence of EphA3. We suggest that pre-leukaemic self-renewal in this model is a complex interplay of cell-intrinsic and -extrinsic factors, and that multiple redundant pathways to leukaemogenesis are active.

The NUP98-HOXD13 fusion oncogene induces thymocyte self-renewal via Lmo2/Lyl1.

T cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (T-ALL) cases include subfamilies that overexpress the TAL1/LMO, TLX1/3 and HOXA transcription factor oncogenes. While it has been shown that TAL1/LMO transcription factors induce self-renewal of thymocytes, whether this is true for other transcription factor oncogenes is unknown. To address this, we have studied NUP98-HOXD13-transgenic (NHD13-Tg) mice, which overexpress HOXA transcription factors throughout haematopoiesis and develop both myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) progressing to acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) as well as T-ALL. We find that thymocytes from preleukaemic NHD13-Tg mice can serially transplant, demonstrating that they have self-renewal capacity. Transcriptome analysis shows that NHD13-Tg thymocytes exhibit a stem cell-like transcriptional programme closely resembling that induced by Lmo2, including Lmo2 itself and its critical cofactor Lyl1. To determine whether Lmo2/Lyl1 are required for NHD13-induced thymocyte self-renewal, NHD13-Tg mice were crossed with Lyl1 knockout mice. This showed that Lyl1 is essential for expression of the stem cell-like gene expression programme in thymocytes and self-renewal. Surprisingly however, NHD13 transgenic mice lacking Lyl1 showed accelerated T-ALL and absence of transformation to AML, associated with a loss of multipotent progenitors in the bone marrow. Thus multiple T cell oncogenes induce thymocyte self-renewal via Lmo2/Lyl1; however, NHD13 can also promote T-ALL via an alternative pathway.

The fusion partner specifies the oncogenic potential of NUP98 fusion proteins.

NUP98 is among the most promiscuously translocated genes in hematological diseases. Among the 28 known fusion partners, there are two categories: homeobox genes and non-homeobox genes. The homeobox fusion partners are well-studied in animal models, resulting in HoxA cluster overexpression and hematological disease. The non-homeobox fusion partners are less well studied. We created transgenic animal models for three NUP98 fusion genes (one homeobox, two non-homeobox), and show that in this system, the NUP98-homeobox fusion promotes self-renewal and aberrant gene expression to a significantly greater extent. We conclude that homeobox partners create more potent NUP98 fusion oncogenes than do non-homeobox partners.