Project description:The transcriptional activating and repressive functions performed by Trithorax and Polycomb group complexes, respectively, are critical for to maintain cellular fates in ontogeny and in cancer. Here we report that leukemias initiated by a Trithorax-related oncogene, MLL-AF9, depend upon the Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 (PRC2) to sustain a transformed cellular state. RNAi mediated suppression of PRC2 subunits is sufficient to inhibit proliferation of MLL-AF9 leukemias, with little impact on growth of non-transformed cells. This requirement is partly due to PRC2-mediated transcriptional repression of several anti-self-renewal regulators, including Cdkn2a. These results suggest that, unlike the classical antagonism generally observed between Polycomb and Trithorax group proteins during development, the activities of these two pathways can cooperate to promote myeloid neoplasia. In order to understand downstream targets of PRC2 complex in MLL-AF9 leukemia, we performed array in murine MLL-AF9/NrasG12D cell line under the condition that two subunits of PRC2(Eed and Suz12) were suppressed by using shRNAs.
Project description:Remodeling of deregulated polycomb histone modifications promotes development of Down syndrome-related acute megakaryoblastic leukemia
Project description:co-IP assays demonstrate that KDM6A is bound to WDR5, facilitating its association with the COMPASS complex and the polycomb repressive complex at the expected target loci.
2024-12-04 | PXD058594 |
Project description:The Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 Is Required For MLL-AF9 Leukemia
Project description:Despite the impact of DNMT3A mutation in acute myeloid leukemia has been emphasized, the precise molecular mechanisms in leukemogenesis are largely unknown. Here we show that, in murine transplantation experiments, recipients transplanted with DNMT3A mutant-transduced cells exhibit aberrant hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) accumulation. Differentiation-associated genes are down-regulated without accompanying changes in methylation status of their promoter-associated CpG islands in DNMT3A mutant-transduced stem/progenitor cells. DNMT3A mutant also promotes monoblastic transformation in vitro in combination with HOXA9. Molecularly, DNMT3A mutant interacts with polycomb repressive complex 1 (PRC1), leading to transcriptional silencing of PU.1. Suppression of PRC1 impairs aberrant HSC accumulation and monoblastic transformation. Taken together, our results highlight the functional role of DNMT3A mutation, forming the basis for leukemia development.
Project description:The Bmi1 Polycomb protein is involved in the epigenetic repressive control of self renewal and survival of cancer initiating cells. In Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML), bmi1 expression increases gradually as the disease progresses from a chronic latent phase to a deadly blast crisis. We developped an inducible shRNA system to silence Bmi1 in the human K562 chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) cell line in order to identify new Bmi1-target genes. Gene profiling was performed on inducible shBmi1-K562 cells incubated without (P3-K562+shBMI1) or with doxycycline for 96h (P4-K562+shBMI1+doxycycline) using HG-U133 Plus2 Affymetrix Arrays.
Project description:MIR139 is a critical tumor suppressor and commonly silenced in human cancer, including acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Here, we found that depletion of identified MIR139 targets affects AML outgrowth. We unraveled the mechanism of MIR139 gene inactivation in AML expressing the Mixed-Lineage Leukemia (MLL)-AF9 oncogene. Epigenetic analyses revealed two well-conserved putative enhancer regions in close proximity of transcriptional start sites (TSS) of MIR139. These regions were silenced by the Polycomb-Repressive Complex-2 (PRC2) downstream of MLL-AF9. Genomic deletion of these regions abolished MIR139 transcriptional regulation in normal and oncogenic conditions. Genome-wide knockout screens revealed the transcriptional pausing factor of RNA Polymerase-II, POLR2M, as a critical MIR139-silencing factor. Furthermore, direct POLR2M binding to the MIR139 TSS induced paused transcription, which was abrogated upon PRC2 inhibition. We present evidence for an oncogenic POLR2M-mediated MIR139 silencing mechanism, downstream of MLL-AF9 and PRC2. Together, our findings highlight the importance of POLR2M-mediated paused transcription in AML.