RESUMO
Immunotherapeutic approaches, particularly programmed death 1/programmed death ligand 1 (PD-1/PD-L1) blockade, have improved the treatment of non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), supporting the premise that evasion of immune destruction is of importance for NSCLC progression. However, the signals responsible for upregulation of PD-L1 in NSCLC cells and whether they are integrated with the regulation of other immune-related genes are not known. Mucin 1 (MUC1) is aberrantly overexpressed in NSCLC, activates the nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) p65âï¸ZEB1 pathway and confers a poor prognosis. The present studies demonstrate that MUC1-C activates PD-L1 expression in NSCLC cells. We show that MUC1-C increases NF-κB p65 occupancy on the CD274/PD-L1 promoter and thereby drives CD274 transcription. Moreover, we demonstrate that MUC1-C-induced activation of NF-κBâï¸ZEB1 signaling represses the TLR9 (toll-like receptor 9), IFNG, MCP-1 (monocyte chemoattractant protein-1) and GM-CSF genes, and that this signature is associated with decreases in overall survival. In concert with these results, targeting MUC1-C in NSCLC tumors suppresses PD-L1 and induces these effectors of innate and adaptive immunity. These findings support a previously unrecognized central role for MUC1-C in integrating PD-L1 activation with suppression of immune effectors and poor clinical outcome.
Assuntos
Antígeno B7-H1/genética , Carcinoma Pulmonar de Células não Pequenas , Imunidade Celular/genética , Neoplasias Pulmonares , Mucina-1/fisiologia , Evasão Tumoral/genética , Células A549 , Animais , Carcinoma Pulmonar de Células não Pequenas/genética , Carcinoma Pulmonar de Células não Pequenas/imunologia , Carcinoma Pulmonar de Células não Pequenas/patologia , Linhagem Celular Tumoral , Feminino , Regulação Neoplásica da Expressão Gênica , Humanos , Neoplasias Pulmonares/genética , Neoplasias Pulmonares/imunologia , Neoplasias Pulmonares/patologia , Camundongos , Camundongos Nus , Transdução de Sinais/genética , Transdução de Sinais/imunologiaRESUMO
B-cell-specific Moloney murine leukemia virus integration site 1 (BMI1) is a component of the polycomb repressive complex 1 (PRC1) complex that is overexpressed in breast and other cancers, and promotes self-renewal of cancer stem-like cells. The oncogenic mucin 1 (MUC1) C-terminal (MUC1-C) subunit is similarly overexpressed in human carcinoma cells and has been linked to their self-renewal. There is no known relationship between MUC1-C and BMI1 in cancer. The present studies demonstrate that MUC1-C drives BMI1 transcription by a MYC-dependent mechanism in breast and other cancer cells. In addition, we show that MUC1-C blocks miR-200c-mediated downregulation of BMI1 expression. The functional significance of this MUC1-Câï¸BMI1 pathway is supported by the demonstration that targeting MUC1-C suppresses BMI1-induced ubiquitylation of H2A and thereby derepresses homeobox HOXC5 and HOXC13 gene expression. Notably, our results further show that MUC1-C binds directly to BMI1 and promotes occupancy of BMI1 on the CDKN2A promoter. In concert with BMI1-induced repression of the p16INK4a tumor suppressor, we found that targeting MUC1-C is associated with induction of p16INK4a expression. In support of these results, analysis of three gene expresssion data sets demonstrated highly significant correlations between MUC1-C and BMI1 in breast cancers. These findings uncover a previously unrecognized role for MUC1-C in driving BMI1 expression and in directly interacting with this stem cell factor, linking MUC1-C with function of the PRC1 in epigenetic gene silencing.
Assuntos
Mucina-1/metabolismo , Neoplasias/metabolismo , Complexo Repressor Polycomb 1/metabolismo , Motivos de Aminoácidos , Sequência de Aminoácidos , Linhagem Celular Tumoral , Inibidor p16 de Quinase Dependente de Ciclina/genética , Inibidor p16 de Quinase Dependente de Ciclina/metabolismo , Regulação Neoplásica da Expressão Gênica , Inativação Gênica , Histonas/metabolismo , Proteínas de Homeodomínio/genética , Proteínas de Homeodomínio/metabolismo , Humanos , Mucina-1/química , Mucina-1/genética , NF-kappa B/metabolismo , Neoplasias/genética , Regiões Promotoras Genéticas , Ligação Proteica , Domínios e Motivos de Interação entre Proteínas , Proteínas Proto-Oncogênicas c-myc/metabolismo , Transcrição Gênica , UbiquitinaçãoRESUMO
Aberrant expression of the DNA methyltransferases (DNMTs) and disruption of DNA methylation patterns are associated with carcinogenesis and cancer cell survival. The oncogenic MUC1-C protein is aberrantly overexpressed in diverse carcinomas; however, there is no known link between MUC1-C and DNA methylation. Our results demonstrate that MUC1-C induces the expression of DNMT1 and DNMT3b, but not DNMT3a, in breast and other carcinoma cell types. We show that MUC1-C occupies the DNMT1 and DNMT3b promoters in complexes with NF-κB p65 and drives DNMT1 and DNMT3b transcription. In this way, MUC1-C controls global DNA methylation as determined by analysis of LINE-1 repeat elements. The results further demonstrate that targeting MUC1-C downregulates DNA methylation of the CDH1 tumor suppressor gene in association with induction of E-cadherin expression. These findings provide compelling evidence that MUC1-C is of functional importance to induction of DNMT1 and DNMT3b and, in turn, changes in DNA methylation patterns in cancer cells.
