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Canonical and non-canonical regulatory roles of androgen receptor variant 7 in prostate cancer

ABSTRACT: The androgen receptor splice variant 7 (AR-V7) lacks the ligand-binding domain; is detected with increased frequency in advanced prostate cancer and is postulated to be one crucial mechanism for disease progression and therapeutic resistance to androgen deprivation in castration–resistant prostate cancer (CRPC). Targeting AR-V7 or unique downstream targets could provide novel therapeutic approaches for CRPC. Here, we report that, independent of ligand, AR-V7 binds not only to the androgen-responsive element (ARE) sites inducing canonical AR signaling but also to non-canonical target sites where ligand-stimulated full-length AR (AR-FL) does not bind. These AR-V7 “solo” binding sites are mainly found at gene promoters and are co-occupied by a zinc-finger transcription factor ZFX and the co-activator BRD4, both of which physically interact with AR-V7. Consequently, AR-V7 not only recapitulates AR-FL action without androgen but uniquely regulates transcripts correlating with AR-V7 expression in the TCGA prostate cancer cohort. Mechanistically, ZFX appears to function as a pioneer factor for AR-V7 at solo-binding sites and BRD4 inhibitors but not anti-androgens suppress AR-V7 action at solo-binding sites as well as AR-V7-dependent growth. Additionally, knockdown of ZFX, or two downstream targets uniquely co-activated by AR-V7 (ZNF32 and FZD6), also suppressed growth of AR-V7-dependent CRPC cells. AR-V7 directly activated genes differentiate tumor from normal prostate tissues and predict poor prognosis in patients. Thus AR-V7 has both canonical and non-canonical regulatory functions in CRPC, which may provide new therapeutic avenues.

ORGANISM(S): Homo sapiens

PROVIDER: GSE94013 | GEO | 2018/10/02

REPOSITORIES: GEO

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Project description:Continued androgen receptor (AR) signaling is an established mechanism underlying castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), and suppression of AR signaling remains a therapeutic goal of CRPC therapy. Constitutively active androgen receptor splicing variants (AR-Vs) lack the AR ligand-binding domain (AR-LBD), the intended target of androgen deprivation therapies (ADT) including new CRPC therapies such as abiraterone and MDV3100. While the canonical full-length AR (AR-FL) and AR-Vs are both increased in CRPC, their expression regulation, associated transcriptional programs, functional relationships, and respective roles in mediating responses to endocrine therapies have not been dissected. In this study, we show that suppression of canonical AR-FL signaling by targeting AR-LBD leads to increased AR-V expression in two cell line models of CRPC. Importantly, treatment-induced AR-Vs activate a distinct expression signature enriched for cell cycle genes without requiring the presence of AR-FL. Conversely, activation of AR-FL signaling suppresses the AR-V signature but activates expression programs mainly associated with macromolecular synthesis, metabolism, and differentiation. In prostate cancer cells and CRPC xenografts treated with MDV3100 and abiraterone, increased expression of two constitutively active AR-Vs, AR-V7 and ARV567ES, but not AR-FL, parallels increased expression of the AR-driven cell cycle gene UBE2C. In addition, protein expression of AR-V7, but not AR-FL, is positively correlated with UBE2C in clinical CRPC specimens. The cumulative in vitro and in vivo evidence support an adaptive shift toward AR-V-mediated signaling in at least a subset of CRPC tumors as the AR-LBD is rendered inactive, suggesting an important mechanism contributing to drug resistance to CRPC therapies. LNCaP cells lacking AR-V were transfected with AR-V7 with or without androgen stimulation of AR-FL (4 conditions); LNCaP95 cells expressing AR-Vs were treated with control siRNA or siRNA trageting AR-LBD or AR-DBD, with or without androgen stimulation of AR-FL (6 conditions); VCaP cells expressing AR-Vs in the presence of androgen were treated with control siRNA, siRNA trageting AR-LBD, DMSO or MDV3100 to inhibit AR-FL (4 conditions). Total 14 arrays with no replicates.

Project description:The development and progression of castrate resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), a lethal disease, is thought to be driven by multiple events. A hallmark of CRPC is the ability to evade the cytotoxic effects of anti-androgen therapy. Importantly, persistent androgen receptor (AR) signalling is thought to play a principal role in maintaining CRPC. The precise molecular alterations driving this condition, however, are not clearly understood. Our previous studies identified specific metabolic alterations associated with localized prostate cancer (PCa) and CRPC, implicating metabolic re-programming in disease progression. Building on these findings, using a novel network-based integromics approach, here we show distinct alterations in the Hexosamine Biosynthetic Pathway (HBP) to be critical for sustaining the castrate resistant state. We found expression of the HBP enzyme glucosamine-phosphate N-acetyltransferase 1 (GNPNAT1) was regulated by androgens and elevated in androgen dependent (AD) PCa while relatively diminished in CRPC possessing either full length AR (AR-FL) or the spliced V7 variant (AR-V7). Genetic loss of function experiments for GNPNAT1 in CRPC-like cells led to increased proliferation and aggressiveness, both, in vitro and in vivo. This was mediated by specific cell cycle genes regulated by the PI3K-AKT pathway activating either AR in cells with AR-FL or SP1-ChREBP (carbohydrate response element binding protein) in cells containing AR-V7. Strikingly, addition of HBP metabolite UDP-N-acetylglucosamine (UDP) to CRPC-like cells reduced the expression of cell cycle genes and attenuated tumor cell proliferation, both in vitro and in vivo. Furthermore, addition of UDP sensitized CRPC-like cells, inclusive of those possessing AR-V7, to enzalutamide, demonstrating the therapeutic value of targeting altered metabolic pathways in lethal PCa. We anticipate that our findings will motivate the development of novel metabolic therapeutic strategies that complement existing treatments for men with lethal prostate cancer We used microarray analysis to determine key molecular alterations associated with inhibition of HBP pathway in CRPC by knocking down GNPNAT1 transcript level using lentiviral particle bearing shRNA in 22Rv1 and LNCaP-ABL cells GNPNAT1 expression was knockdown in two independent prostate cancer cells, 22Rv1 and LNCaP-ABL

Project description:Enhancer of Zeste Homolog 2 (EZH2) and androgen receptor (AR) are both crucial for the development and progression of prostate tumor, including advanced castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC). Previously, it was reported that, in order to sustain tumorigenicity of prostate cancer, EZH2 has noncanonical functions in interaction with AR for mediating gene activation, in addition to its canonical role as a transcriptional repressor and enzymatic subunit of Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 (PRC2). However, the molecular basis underlying non-canonical activities of EZH2 in prostate cancer remains far from clear, and therapeutic strategies for targeting EZH2:AR-mediated gene-activation activities are also lacking. Here, we report that a hidden transactivation domain of EZH2 (EZH2TAD) binds both AR and AR’s variants enriched in CRPCs, notably AR splice variant 7 (AR-V7), mediating the assembly and/or recruitment of a gene-activation-related complex at genomic sites that lack PRC2 binding. Such noncanonical targets of EZH2:AR/AR-V7:(co)activators are enriched for the clinically-relevant prostate oncogenes. EZH2TAD is crucial for EZH2-mediated transactivation of oncogenes and for CRPC growth in vitro and in vivo. To completely block EZH2’s multifaceted oncogenic activities in prostate cancer, we employed MS177, a recently developed proteolysis targeting chimera (PROTAC) of EZH2. MS177 achieved on-target depletion of both EZH2’s canonical (EZH2:PRC2) and noncanonical (EZH2TAD:AR/AR-V7:coactivators) complexes in prostate tumor, eliciting much more potent antitumor effects than the existing catalytic inhibitors of EZH2. Overall, this study reports previously unappreciated requirements of EZH2TAD for mediating EZH2’s noncanonical recruitment and gene-activation functions in prostate tumor and suggests EZH2-targeting PROTACs as potentially attractive therapeutics for the treatment of aggressive prostate tumors that reply on circuits wired by EZH2 and AR.

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Canonical and non-canonical regulatory roles of androgen receptor variant 7 in prostate cancer

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