Spatial phosphoprotein profiling reveals a compartmentalized extracellular signal-regulated kinase switch governing neurite growth and retraction.

Brain development and spinal cord regeneration require neurite sprouting and growth cone navigation in response to extension and collapsing factors present in the extracellular environment. These external guidance cues control neurite growth cone extension and retraction processes through intracellular protein phosphorylation of numerous cytoskeletal, adhesion, and polarity complex signaling proteins. However, the complex kinase/substrate signaling networks that mediate neuritogenesis have not been investigated. Here, we compare the neurite phosphoproteome under growth and retraction conditions using neurite purification methodology combined with mass spectrometry. More than 4000 non-redundant phosphorylation sites from 1883 proteins have been annotated and mapped to signaling pathways that control kinase/phosphatase networks, cytoskeleton remodeling, and axon/dendrite specification. Comprehensive informatics and functional studies revealed a compartmentalized ERK activation/deactivation cytoskeletal switch that governs neurite growth and retraction, respectively. Our findings provide the first system-wide analysis of the phosphoprotein signaling networks that enable neurite growth and retraction and reveal an important molecular switch that governs neuritogenesis.

Spatial mapping of the neurite and soma proteomes reveals a functional Cdc42/Rac regulatory network.

Neurite extension and growth cone navigation are guided by extracellular cues that control cytoskeletal rearrangements. However, understanding the complex signaling mechanisms that mediate neuritogenesis has been limited by the inability to biochemically separate the neurite and soma for spatial proteomic and bioinformatic analyses. Here, we apply global proteome profiling in combination with a neurite purification methodology for comparative analysis of the soma and neurite proteomes of neuroblastoma cells. The spatial relationship of 4,855 proteins were mapped, revealing networks of signaling proteins that control integrins, the actin cytoskeleton, and axonal guidance in the extending neurite. Bioinformatics and functional analyses revealed a spatially compartmentalized Rac/Cdc42 signaling network that operates in conjunction with multiple guanine-nucleotide exchange factors (GEFs) and GTPase-activating proteins (GAPs) to control neurite formation. Interestingly, RNA interference experiments revealed that the different GEFs and GAPs regulate specialized functions during neurite formation, including neurite growth and retraction kinetics, cytoskeletal organization, and cell polarity. Our findings provide insight into the spatial organization of signaling networks that enable neuritogenesis and provide a comprehensive system-wide profile of proteins that mediate this process, including those that control Rac and Cdc42 signaling.