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C/EBPa mediates the growth inhibitory effect of progestins on breast cancer cells

ABSTRACT: Steroid hormones are key gene regulators in breast cancer cells. While estrogens stimulate cell proliferation, progestins activate a single cell cycle followed by proliferation arrest. Here, we use biochemical and genome wide approaches to show that progestins achieve this effect via a functional crosstalk with C/EBPα. Using ChIP-seq, we identify around 1,000 sites where C/EBPα binding precedes and helps binding of Progesterone Receptor (PR) in response to hormone. These regions exhibit epigenetic marks of active enhancers and C/EBPα maintains an open chromatin conformation that facilitates loading of ligand activated PR. Prior to hormone exposure, C/EBPα favors promoter-enhancer contacts that assure hormonal regulation of key genes involved in cell proliferation by facilitating binding of RAD21, YY1 and the Mediator complex. Knockdown of C/EBPα disrupts enhancer-promoter contacts and decreases the presence of these architectural proteins, highlighting its key role in 3D chromatin looping. Thus, C/EBPα fulfills a previously unknown function as a potential growth modulator in hormone-dependent breast cancer.

ORGANISM(S): Homo sapiens

PROVIDER: GSE132649 | GEO | 2019/07/25

REPOSITORIES: GEO

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Project description:Although non-genomic steroid receptor pathways have been studied over the past decade, little is known about the direct gene expression changes that take place as a consequence of their activation. Progesterone controls proliferation of rat endometrial stromal cells during the peri-implantation phase of pregnancy. We showed that picomolar concentration of progestin R5020 mimics this control in UIII endometrial stromal cells via ERK1-2 and AKT activation mediated by interaction of Progesterone Receptor (PR) with Estrogen Receptor beta (ERb) and without transcriptional activity of endogenous PR and ER. Here we identify early downstream targets of cytoplasmic PR signaling and their possible role in endometrial stromal cell proliferation. Microarray analysis of global gene expression changes in UIII cells treated for 45 min with progestin identified 97 up- and 341 down-regulated genes. The most over-represented molecular functions were transcription factors and regulatory factors associated with cell proliferation and cell cycle, a large fraction of which were repressors down-regulated by hormone. Further analysis verified that progestins regulate Ccnd1, JunD, Usf1, Gfi1, Cyr61, and Cdkn1b through PR-mediated activation of ligand-free ER, ERK1-2 or AKT, in the absence of genomic PR binding. ChIP experiments show that progestin promoted the interaction of USF1 with the proximal promoter of the Cdc2 gene, and Usf1 knockdown abrogated Cdc2 progestin-dependent transcriptional regulation providing a mechanism for direct regulation of its expression. Finally, Cdc2 knockdown blocked R5020 induced UIII cell proliferation. We conclude that progestin induced proliferation of endometrial stromal cells requires ERK1-2 and AKT mediated early regulation of USF1, that induces Cdc2. To our knowledge, this is the first description of early target genes of progestin-activated classical PR via crosstalk with protein kinases and independently of hormone receptor binding to the genomic targets.

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C/EBPa mediates the growth inhibitory effect of progestins on breast cancer cells

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