Cell proliferation and modulation of interaction of estrogen receptors with coregulators induced by ERα and ERß agonists.

The aim of the present study was to investigate modulation of the interaction of the ERα and ERß with coregulators in the ligand responses induced by estrogenic compounds. To this end, selective ERα and ERß agonists were characterized for intrinsic relative potency reflected by EC50 and maximal efficacy towards ERα and ERß mediated response in ER selective reporter gene assays, and subsequently tested for induction of cell proliferation in T47D-ERß cells with variable ERα/ERß ratio, and finally for ligand dependent modulation of the interaction of ERα and ERß with coregulators using the MARCoNI assay, with 154 unique nuclear receptor coregulator peptides derived from 66 different coregulators. Results obtained reveal an important influence of the ERα/ERß ratio and receptor selectivity of the compounds tested on induction of cell proliferation. ERα agonists activate cell proliferation whereas ERß suppresses ERα mediated cell proliferation. The responses in the MARCoNI assay reveal that upon ERα or ERß activation by a specific agonist, the modulation of the interaction of the ERs with coregulators is very similar indicating only a limited number of differences upon ERα or ERß activation by a specific ligand. Differences in the modulation of the interaction of the ERs with coregulators between the different agonists were more pronounced. Based on ligand dependent differences in the modulation of the interaction of the ERs with coregulators, the MARCoNI assay was shown to be able to classify the ER agonists discriminating between different agonists for the same receptor, a characteristic not defined by the ER selective reporter gene or proliferation assays. It is concluded that the ultimate effect of the model compounds on proliferation of estrogen responsive cells depends on the intrinsic relative potency of the agonist towards ERα and ERß and the cellular ERα/ERß ratio whereas differences in the modulation of the interaction of the ERα and ERß with coregulators contribute to the ligand dependent responses induced by estrogenic compounds.