Crystallization of the membrane protein hVDAC1 produced in cell-free system.

Structural studies of membrane proteins are in constant evolution with the development of new improvements for their expression, purification, stabilization and crystallization. However, none of these methods still provides a universal approach to solve the structure of membrane proteins. Here we describe the crystallization of the human voltage-dependent anion channel-1 produced by a bacterial cell-free expression system. While VDAC structures have been recently solved, we propose an alternative strategy for producing the recombinant protein, which can be applied to other membrane proteins reluctant to expression, purification and crystallization by classical approaches. Despite a lot of efforts to crystallize a cell-free expressed membrane protein, this study is to our knowledge one of the first reports of a successful crystallization. Focusing on expression in a soluble and functional state, in a detergent environment, is the key to get crystals. Although the diffraction of VDAC crystals is limited, the simplicity and the rapidity to set-up and optimize this technology are drastic advantages in comparison to other methods.

High level production of secreted proteins: example of the human tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases 1.

The major difficulty for high-throughput screening of therapeutic protein candidates in experimental animal models of pathologies or for structural studies is their fast and efficient production. The tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases (TIMPs) considered to play a role in many physiological and pathological processes, such as arthritis or cancer, by inhibiting matrix metalloproteinases or acting as signalling molecules, have always been produced with huge difficulties. We hereby propose a new method to overproduce human recombinant TIMP-1 by transient expression in HEK293E cells, followed by a one-step chromatography purification, yielding in only 2 weeks, dozens of milligrams of pure, stable, glycosylated and active protein for in vitro and in vivo studies. This easy to set up, rapid, and efficient method could be applied for any naturally secreted mammalian protein.

MyoD binds to Mos and inhibits the Mos/MAP kinase pathway.

When ectopically expressed, the serine/threonine kinase Mos can induce oncogenic transformation of somatic cells by direct phosphorylation of MAP kinase/ERK kinase (MEK1), activating the mitogen-activated protein kinases ERK1 and ERK2. On the other hand, overexpression of Mos in C2C12 myoblasts is not transforming. Mos activates myogenic differentiation by promoting heterodimerization of the MyoD/E12 proteins, increasing the expression of myogenic markers and the positive autoregulatory loop of MyoD. In this study, we show that in myogenic cells, the mitogenic and oncogenic signalling from the Mos/MEK/ERK pathway is suppressed by MyoD through the formation of a heterotrimeric complex.

Speedy: a novel cell cycle regulator of the G2/M transition.

Stage VI Xenopus oocytes are suspended at the G2/M transition of meiosis I, and represent an excellent system for the identification and examination of cell cycle regulatory proteins. Essential cell cycle regulators such as MAPK, cyclins and mos have the ability to induce oocyte maturation, causing the resumption of the cell cycle from its arrested state. We have identified the product of a novel Xenopus gene, Speedy or Spy1, which is able to induce rapid maturation of Xenopus oocytes, resulting in the induction of germinal vesicle breakdown (GVBD) and activation of M-phasepromoting factor (MPF). Spy1 activates the MAPK pathway in oocytes, and its ability to induce maturation is dependent upon this pathway. Spy1-induced maturation occurs much more rapidly than maturation induced by other cell cycle regulators including progesterone, mos or Ras, and does not require any of these proteins or hormones, indicating that Spy1-induced maturation proceeds through a novel regulatory pathway. In addition, we have shown that Spy1 physically interacts with cdk2, and prematurely activates cdk2 kinase activity. Spy1 therefore represents a novel cell cycle regulatory protein, inducing maturation through the activation of MAPK and MPF, and also leading to the premature activation of cdk2.

Mos activates myogenic differentiation by promoting heterodimerization of MyoD and E12 proteins.

The activities of myogenic basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) factors are regulated by a number of different positive and negative signals. Extensive information has been published about the molecular mechanisms that interfere with the process of myogenic differentiation, but little is known about the positive signals. We previously showed that overexpression of rat Mos in C2C12 myoblasts increased the expression of myogenic markers whereas repression of Mos products by antisense RNAs inhibited myogenic differentiation. In the present work, our results show that the rat mos proto-oncogene activates transcriptional activity of MyoD protein. In transient transfection assays, Mos promotes transcriptional transactivation by MyoD of the muscle creatine kinase enhancer and/or a reporter gene linked to MyoD-DNA binding sites. Physical interaction between Mos and MyoD, but not with E12, is demonstrated in vivo by using the two-hybrid approach with C3H10T1/2 cells and in vitro by using the glutathione S-transferase (GST) pull-down assays. Unphosphorylated MyoD from myogenic cell lysates and/or bacterially expressed MyoD physically interacts with Mos. This interaction occurs via the helix 2 region of MyoD and a highly conserved region in Mos proteins with 40% similarity to the helix 2 domain of the E-protein class of bHLH factors. Phosphorylation of MyoD by activated GST-Mos protein inhibits the DNA-binding activity of MyoD homodimers and promotes MyoD-E12 heterodimer formation. These data support a novel function for Mos as a mediator (coregulator) of muscle-specific gene(s) expression.

Identification of a novel regulatory element in the c-mos locus that activates transcription in somatic cells.

We have identified a DNA sequence in the 5' flanking sequence of rat c-mos gene which fulfills operational criteria for enhancers, increasing transcription from heterologous promoters in somatic cells. This new enhancer region contains some specific motifs such as two CArG boxes, two M-CAT binding sites and CCAAT consensus sequences. This Upstream Enhancer region (UER) is recognized by distinct protein complexes and particularly CArG2 and M-CAT R1 motifs, which are adjacent in the DNA sequence. Several lines of evidence indicate that none of the two CArG boxes bind to the Serum response factor (SRF). Site-directed mutations of both the CArG2 and M-CAT R1 binding sites suppress their enhancer activity. These results suggest that direct and indirect interactions involving multiple nuclear factors and distinct elements of the UER may be required for its enhancer functions in somatic cells.

Myogenin binds to and represses c-fos promoter.

Myogenin (a member of the myogenic basic helix-loop-helix transcription factor family) seems to be the main effector of proliferation repression, a crucial step which precedes muscle cell terminal differentiation during muscle development. Proliferation repression most likely occurs through inhibition of proliferation-associated genes such as the proto-oncogene, c-fos. Here, we demonstrate that myogenin binds to an E-box located in the main element of the c-fos promoter, the serum response element (SRE). Results from co-transfection experiments indicate that myogenin acts as a repressor for the SRE. Our data suggest that myogenin could play a role in c-fos inhibition at the onset of muscle cell terminal differentiation.

p34cdc2 protein is complexed with the c-mos protein in rat skeletal muscle.

We have used fractionation of subcellular components of the skeletal muscle followed by Western blot analyses to study the localization of the c-mos protein in adult rat muscle. We find that p43c-mos is predominantly located in the KCl supernatant fraction. We show that immunoprecipitates of p43c-mos phosphorylate in vitro two polypeptides of about 34 kDa and 80 kDa respectively. Muscle fractionation and immunodetection studies showed that the p34 protein associated with p43c-mos is the cdc2 protein. p43c-mos is coprecipitated with p34cdc2 when using either anti PSTAIR antibody, antibody directed against the conserved COOH terminal region of the p34cdc2 and by binding to beads that contain cross-linked p13suc1, a protein known to bind p34cdc2. Likewise p34cdc2 coprecipitated with p43c-mos when using anti mos antibody. However p43c-mos is not present in histone H1 kinase active p34cdc2 complex precipitated with anti p34cdc2 COOH-terminal peptide antibody. In adult muscle tissue tubulin is not complexed with p34cdc2 and p43c-mos as previously observed in c-mos and v-mos transformed cells. Gel filtration and crosslinking experiments show that a 170 kDa complex contains c-mos and p34cdc2 proteins. In addition during postnatal development of skeletal muscle we observe modifications in the migration pattern of p34cdc2 correlated with the accumulation of p43c-mos. Our findings raise the possibility of a p43c-mos-p34cdc2 complex could play a role in the differentiation process and maintenance of myotubes in Go.

Repression of c-fos promoter by MyoD on muscle cell differentiation.

Terminal differentiation and cell proliferation are in many cases, as in muscle cells, mutually exclusive processes. While differentiating myoblasts are withdrawn from the cell cycle, myogenesis is inhibited by some mitogens and overexpression of some oncogenes, including proto-oncogene c-fos (which expresses a growth-associated protein constituting the regulatory factor AP-1 in conjunction with c-Jun). MyoD, a muscle-specific transcription factor of the basic helix-loop-helix family, acts at both levels because it triggers a muscle differentiation programme in non-muscle cells, and induces a complete block of cell proliferation. Antagonistic interaction between MyoD and c-Jun has been demonstrated. We here show that c-fos expression greatly decreases upon muscle cell differentiation, concomitant with MyoD-induced activity. We have identified a MyoD-binding site overlapping with the serum-responsive element in the c-fos promoter. We demonstrate that MyoD can act as a negative regulator for c-fos transcription by blocking serum responsiveness through this binding site. These data suggest that the MyoD negative effect on cell growth could be partly mediated by transcriptional inactivation of growth-responsive genes.

Identification of a cis acting element responsible for muscle specific expression of the c-mos protooncogene.

A series of deletion constructs of the 5' flanking region of rat c-mos gene was positioned upstream to the CAT gene and transfected into muscle and non-muscle cells. CAT activities revealed that a region located downstream of a TATA box and containing the proximal transcription start site is the muscle c-mos promoter. This promoter is more efficient in L6 alpha 1 myoblasts than in L6 alpha 1 myotubes but not in C3H10T1/2 cells. Gel shift assays demonstrated that nuclear proteins from myoblasts and myotubes formed complexes migrating differently. Footprinting analyses showed that nuclear proteins from L6 alpha 1 myoblasts protected a DNA fragment located at position nt -979 to nt -938 relative to the first ATG of the rat c-mos ORF while nuclear proteins from myotubes protected the DNA between nt -998 to nt -928. Furthermore one of protein - DNA complexes containing the proximal transcription start site, included a consensus sequence TGTC(AGT/TCG)CC(A/T)G present in the initiator element (Inr) of several genes. Southwestern blot analysis pointed to a 82kDa polypeptide as a potential candidate for trans acting factor in myoblasts. In L6 alpha 1 myotubes this polypeptide is replaced by other proteins of 40-42kDa and 82kDa. An interplay between these two complexes may constitute a developmental as well as a physiologically regulated mechanism that modulates c-mos expression during the early stages of myogenesis.

Accumulation of the c-mos protein is correlated with post-natal development of skeletal muscle.

Previously we reported that c-mos proto-oncogene RNA was developmentally up-regulated during post-natal maturation of the rat skeletal muscle. Using two different site-directed affinity-purified antipeptide antibodies we can observe that c-mos product (p43 c-mos) accumulates increasingly during post-natal development of the skeletal muscle and exhibits protein kinase activity. We find that in adult rat p43 c-mos is 10-fold higher in skeletal muscle than in ovaries, and 20- to 40-fold higher than in heart, lung, testis and liver, and may represent about 0.005% of the total soluble proteins. In addition adult skeletal muscle from Xenopus, mouse and man was found to contain p43 c-mos. These data argue in favour of a novel muscle-specific function of c-mos.

Rat myogenic c-mos cDNA: cloning sequence analysis and regulation during muscle development.

We have isolated and sequenced a cDNA clone, homologous to the rat c-mos gene, from a cDNA library of rat skeletal muscles. The 3220 nucleotide cDNA clone codes for a protein of 339 amino acids (37.4 kDa). Both the nucleotide sequence and the deduced amino acid sequence show 60-90% overall homology to Xenopus, chicken, mouse and human mos. By Northern blot analysis, we detected two c-mos transcripts, one major of about 3.6 Kb long, and one minor of about 1.7 Kb long. These are differently regulated during the development of cardiac and skeletal muscles. By Western blot with two antibodies directed against two different portions of the mos protein, we observed in rat muscle two polypeptides of 43 kDa, and 75 kDa respectively.