Project description:Diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is the most common B cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma and remains incurable in around 40% of patients. Efforts to sequence the coding genome identified several genes and pathways that are altered in this disease, including potential therapeutic targets1-5. However, the non-coding genome of DLBCL remains largely unexplored. Here we show that active super-enhancers are highly and specifically hypermutated in 92% of samples from individuals with DLBCL, display signatures of activation-induced cytidine deaminase activity, and are linked to genes that encode B cell developmental regulators and oncogenes. As evidence of oncogenic relevance, we show that the hypermutated super-enhancers linked to the BCL6, BCL2 and CXCR4 proto-oncogenes prevent the binding and transcriptional downregulation of the corresponding target gene by transcriptional repressors, including BLIMP1 (targeting BCL6) and the steroid receptor NR3C1 (targeting BCL2 and CXCR4). Genetic correction of selected mutations restored repressor DNA binding, downregulated target gene expression and led to the counter-selection of cells containing corrected alleles, indicating an oncogenic dependency on the super-enhancer mutations. This pervasive super-enhancer mutational mechanism reveals a major set of genetic lesions deregulating gene expression, which expands the involvement of known oncogenes in DLBCL pathogenesis and identifies new deregulated gene targets of therapeutic relevance.
Project description:Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) causes primary effusion lymphoma (PEL). The cellular transcription factor (TF) interferon (IFN) regulatory factor 4 (IRF4) is an essential oncogene in PEL, but its specific role in PEL and how KSHV deregulates IRF4 remain unknown. Here, we report that the KSHV latency protein viral interferon regulatory factor 3 (vIRF3) cooperates with IRF4 and cellular BATF (basic leucine zipper ATF-like TF) to drive a super-enhancer (SE)-mediated oncogenic transcriptional program in PEL. Chromatin immunoprecipitation coupled with next-generation sequencing (ChIP-Seq) experiments demonstrated that IRF4, vIRF3, and BATF cooccupy the SEs of key survival genes, in a pattern that is distinct from those seen with other IRF4-driven malignancies. All three proteins cooperatively drive SE-mediated IRF4 overexpression. Inactivation of vIRF3 and, to a lesser extent, BATF phenocopies the gene expression changes and loss of cellular viability observed upon inactivation of IRF4. In sum, this work suggests that KSHV vIRF3 and cellular IRF4 and BATF cooperate as oncogenic transcription factors on SEs to promote cellular survival and proliferation in KSHV-associated lymphomas.IMPORTANCE Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) causes the aggressive disease primary effusion lymphoma (PEL). Here, we show that a viral transcription factor (vIRF3) cooperates with the cellular transcription factor IRF4 to control an oncogenic gene expression program in PEL cells. These proteins promote KSHV-mediated B cell transformation by activating the expression of prosurvival genes through super-enhancers. Our report thus demonstrates that this DNA tumor virus encodes a transcription factor that functions with cellular IRF4 to drive oncogenic transcriptional reprogramming.
Project description:Adult T-cell leukemia/lymphoma (ATL) is an intractable hematological malignancy with extremely poor prognosis. Recent studies have revealed that super-enhancers (SE) play important roles in controlling tumor-specific gene expression and are potential therapeutic targets for neoplastic diseases including ATL. Cyclin-dependent protein kinase (CDK) 9 is a component of a complex comprising transcription factors (TFs) that bind the SE region. Alvocidib is a CDK9 inhibitor that exerts antitumor activity by inhibiting RNA polymerase (Pol) II phosphorylation and suppressing SE-mediated, tumor-specific gene expression. The present study demonstrated that alvocidib inhibited the proliferation of ATL cell lines and tumor cells from patients with ATL. RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing (ChIP-Seq) disclosed that SE regulated IRF4 in the ATL cell lines. Previous studies showed that IRF4 suppression inhibited ATL cell proliferation. Hence, IRF4 is a putative alvocidib target in ATL therapy. The present study revealed that SE-mediated IRF4 downregulation is a possible mechanism by which alvocidib inhibits ATL proliferation. Alvocidib also suppressed ATL in a mouse xenograft model. Hence, the present work demonstrated that alvocidib has therapeutic efficacy against ATL and partially elucidated its mode of action. It also showed that alvocidib is promising for the clinical treatment of ATL and perhaps other malignancies and neoplasms as well.
Project description:BackgroundExtranodal natural killer/T-cell lymphoma (NKTL) is an aggressive type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma with dismal outcome. A better understanding of disease biology and key oncogenic process is necessary for the development of targeted therapy. Super-enhancers (SEs) have been shown to drive pivotal oncogenes in various malignancies. However, the landscape of SEs and SE-associated oncogenes remain elusive in NKTL.MethodsWe used Nano-ChIP-seq of the active enhancer marker histone H3 lysine 27 acetylation (H3K27ac) to profile unique SEs NKTL primary tumor samples. Integrative analysis of RNA-seq and survival data further pinned down high value, novel SE oncogenes. We utilized shRNA knockdown, CRISPR-dCas9, luciferase reporter assay, ChIP-PCR to investigate the regulation of transcription factor (TF) on SE oncogenes. Multi-color immunofluorescence (mIF) staining was performed on an independent cohort of clinical samples. Various function experiments were performed to evaluate the effects of TOX2 on the malignancy of NKTL in vitro and in vivo.ResultsSE landscape was substantially different in NKTL samples in comparison with normal tonsils. Several SEs at key transcriptional factor (TF) genes, including TOX2, TBX21(T-bet), EOMES, RUNX2, and ID2, were identified. We confirmed that TOX2 was aberrantly overexpressed in NKTL relative to normal NK cells and high expression of TOX2 was associated with worse survival. Modulation of TOX2 expression by shRNA, CRISPR-dCas9 interference of SE function impacted on cell proliferation, survival and colony formation ability of NKTL cells. Mechanistically, we found that RUNX3 regulates TOX2 transcription by binding to the active elements of its SE. Silencing TOX2 also impaired tumor formation of NKTL cells in vivo. Metastasis-associated phosphatase PRL-3 has been identified and validated as a key downstream effector of TOX2-mediated oncogenesis.ConclusionsOur integrative SE profiling strategy revealed the landscape of SEs, novel targets and insights into molecular pathogenesis of NKTL. The RUNX3-TOX2-SE-TOX2-PRL-3 regulatory pathway may represent a hallmark of NKTL biology. Targeting TOX2 could be a valuable therapeutic intervene for NKTL patients and warrants further study in clinic.
Project description:Androgen receptor (AR) in prostate cancer (PCa) can drive transcriptional repression of multiple genes including MYC, and supraphysiological androgen is effective in some patients. Here, we show that this repression is independent of AR chromatin binding and driven by coactivator redistribution, and through chromatin conformation capture methods show disruption of the interaction between the MYC super-enhancer within the PCAT1 gene and the MYC promoter. Conversely, androgen deprivation in vitro and in vivo increases MYC expression. In parallel, global AR activity is suppressed by MYC overexpression, consistent with coactivator redistribution. These suppressive effects of AR and MYC are mitigated at shared AR/MYC binding sites, which also have markedly higher levels of H3K27 acetylation, indicating enrichment for functional enhancers. These findings demonstrate an intricate balance between AR and MYC, and indicate that increased MYC in response to androgen deprivation contributes to castration-resistant PCa, while decreased MYC may contribute to responses to supraphysiological androgen therapy.
Project description:BackgroundTranscriptional programs control cell fate, and identifying their components is critical for understanding diseases caused by cell lesion, such as podocytopathy. Although many transcription factors (TFs) are necessary for cell-state maintenance in glomeruli, their roles in transcriptional regulation are not well understood.MethodsThe distribution of H3K27ac histones in human glomerulus cells was analyzed to identify superenhancer-associated TFs, and ChIP-seq and transcriptomics were performed to elucidate the regulatory roles of the TFs. Transgenic animal models of disease were further investigated to confirm the roles of specific TFs in podocyte maintenance.ResultsSuperenhancer distribution revealed a group of potential TFs in core regulatory circuits in human glomerulus cells, including FOXC1/2, WT1, and LMX1B. Integration of transcriptome and cistrome data of FOXC1/2 in mice resolved transcriptional regulation in podocyte maintenance. FOXC1/2 regulated differentiation-associated transcription in mature podocytes. In both humans and animal models, mature podocyte injury was accompanied by deregulation of FOXC1/2 expression, and FOXC1/2 overexpression could protect podocytes in zebrafish.ConclusionsFOXC1/2 maintain podocyte differentiation through transcriptional stabilization. The genome-wide chromatin resources support further investigation of TFs' regulatory roles in glomeruli transcription programs.
Project description:MYC is a transcriptional factor that regulates growth and proliferation through cell cycle pathways. MYC alterations, in particular MYC rearrangements, are important in assessing the prognosis of aggressive B-cell lymphoma. In this study, we focused on the impact of nine major cell cycle genes for MYC-driven aggressive mature B-cell lymphoma and analyzed the mutational status using targeted next generation sequencing. Our 40 cases of aggressive mature B-cell lymphomas included 5 Burkitt lymphomas, 17 high-grade B-cell lymphomas and 18 diffuse large B-cell lymphomas with MYC breaks in 100%, 88% and 11%, respectively. Our data allowed a molecular classification into four categories partially independent from the histopathological diagnosis but correlating with the Ki-67 labelling index: (I) harboring TP53 and CDKN2A mutations, being highly proliferative, (II) with MYC rearrangement associated with MYC and/or ID3 mutations, being highly proliferative, (III) with MYC rearrangement combined with additional molecular changes, being highly proliferative, and (IV) with a diverse pattern of molecular alterations, being less proliferative. Taken together, we found that mutations of TP53, CDKN2A, MYC and ID3 are associated with highly proliferative B-cell lymphomas that could profit from novel therapeutic strategies.
Project description:Diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) is a biologically heterogeneous and clinically aggressive disease. Here, we explore the role of bromodomain and extra-terminal domain (BET) proteins in DLBCL, using integrative chemical genetics and functional epigenomics. We observe highly asymmetric loading of bromodomain 4 (BRD4) at enhancers, with approximately 33% of all BRD4 localizing to enhancers at 1.6% of occupied genes. These super-enhancers prove particularly sensitive to bromodomain inhibition, explaining the selective effect of BET inhibitors on oncogenic and lineage-specific transcriptional circuits. Functional study of genes marked by super-enhancers identifies DLBCLs dependent on OCA-B and suggests a strategy for discovering unrecognized cancer dependencies. Translational studies performed on a comprehensive panel of DLBCLs establish a therapeutic rationale for evaluating BET inhibitors in this disease.
Project description:Aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas (NHL) in children, adolescents, and young adults (CAYA) include Burkitt lymphoma (BL), diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), and a subset of high-grade tumors with features intermediate between these entities whose genetic and molecular profiles have not been completely elucidated. In this study, we have characterized 37 aggressive B-NHL in CAYA, 33 with high-grade morphology, and 4 DLBCL with MYC rearrangement (MYC-R), using targeted next-generation sequencing and the aggressive lymphoma gene expression germinal center B-cell-like (GCB), activated B-cell-like (ABC), and dark zone signatures (DZsig). Twenty-two tumors had MYC-R without BCL2 breaks, and two MYC-non-R cases had BCL6 translocations. MYC-R cases, including DLBCL, carried BL-related mutations and copy number alterations. Conversely, MYC-non-R lymphomas had alterations in the B-cell receptor signaling/NF-κB pathway (71%). DZsig was expressed in 12/13 of MYC-R tumors but only in 2/10 of MYC-non-R GCB tumors (P < 0.001). The 3-year event-free survival (EFS) of the whole cohort was 79.6%. TP53 and KMT2C mutations conferred inferior outcome (3-year EFS P < 0.05). Overall, MYC-R lymphomas in CAYA have a molecular profile similar to BL regardless of their high-grade or DLBCL morphology, whereas MYC-non-R has more heterogeneous genetic alterations closer to that of DLBCL.
Project description:Blastic plasmacytoid dendritic cell neoplasm (BPDCN) is an aggressive subtype of acute leukemia, the cell of origin of which is considered to be precursors of plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs). Since translocation (6;8)(p21;q24) is a recurrent anomaly for BPDCN, we demonstrate that a pDC-specific super-enhancer of RUNX2 is associated with the MYC promoter due to t(6;8). RUNX2 ensures the expression of pDC-signature genes in leukemic cells, but also confers survival and proliferative properties in BPDCN cells. Furthermore, the pDC-specific RUNX2 super-enhancer is hijacked to activate MYC in addition to RUNX2 expression, thereby promoting the proliferation of BPDCN. We also demonstrate that the transduction of MYC and RUNX2 is sufficient to initiate the transformation of BPDCN in mice lacking Tet2 and Tp53, providing a model that accurately recapitulates the aggressive human disease and gives an insight into the molecular mechanisms underlying the pathogenesis of BPDCN.