scholarly journals Small-molecule inhibitor targeting orphan nuclear receptor COUP-TFII for prostate cancer treatment

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (18) ◽  
pp. eaaz8031 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leiming Wang ◽  
Chiang-Min Cheng ◽  
Jun Qin ◽  
Mafei Xu ◽  
Chung-Yang Kao ◽  
...  

The orphan nuclear receptor COUP-TFII is expressed at a low level in adult tissues, but its expression is increased and shown to promote progression of multiple diseases, including prostate cancer, heart failure, and muscular dystrophy. Suppression of COUP-TFII slows disease progression, making it an intriguing therapeutic target. Here, we identified a potent and specific COUP-TFII inhibitor through high-throughput screening. The inhibitor specifically suppressed COUP-TFII activity to regulate its target genes. Mechanistically, the inhibitor directly bound to the COUP-TFII ligand-binding domain and disrupted COUP-TFII interaction with transcription regulators, including FOXA1, thus repressing COUP-TFII activity on target gene regulation. Through blocking COUP-TFII’s oncogenic activity in prostate cancer, the inhibitor efficiently exerted a potent antitumor effect in xenograft mouse models and patient-derived xenograft models. Our study identified a potent and specific COUP-TFII inhibitor that may be useful for the treatment of prostate cancer and possibly other diseases.

Endocrinology ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harika Nagandla ◽  
Matthew J Robertson ◽  
Vasanta Putluri ◽  
Nagireddy Putluri ◽  
Cristian Coarfa ◽  
...  

Abstract Androgen receptor (AR) signaling continues to drive castration resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) in spite of androgen deprivation therapy (ADT). Constitutively active shorter variants of AR, lacking the ligand binding domain, are frequently expressed in CRPC and have emerged as a potential mechanism for prostate cancer to escape ADT. ARv7 and AR v567es are two of the most commonly detected variants of AR in clinical samples of advanced, metastatic prostate cancer. It is not clear if variants of AR merely act as weaker substitutes for AR or can mediate unique isoform specific activities different from AR. In this study, we employed LNCaP prostate cancer cell lines with inducible expression of ARv7 or AR v567es to delineate similarities and differences in transcriptomics, metabolomics and lipidomics resulting from the activation of AR, ARv7 or AR v567es. While the majority of target genes were similarly regulated by the action of all three isoforms, we found a clear difference in transcriptomic activities of AR versus the variants, and a few differences between ARv7 and AR v567es. Some of the target gene regulation by AR isoforms was similar in the VCaP background as well. Differences in downstream activities of AR isoforms were also evident from comparison of the metabolome and lipidome in an LNCaP model. Overall our study implies that shorter variants of AR are capable of mediating unique downstream activities different from AR and some of these are isoform specific.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (18) ◽  
pp. 9573-9591 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathalie Legrand ◽  
Clemens L Bretscher ◽  
Svenja Zielke ◽  
Bernhard Wilke ◽  
Michael Daude ◽  
...  

Abstract In the absence of ligands, the nuclear receptor PPARβ/δ recruits the NCOR and SMRT corepressors, which form complexes with HDAC3, to canonical target genes. Agonistic ligands cause dissociation of corepressors and enable enhanced transcription. Vice versa, synthetic inverse agonists augment corepressor recruitment and repression. Both basal repression of the target gene ANGPTL4 and reinforced repression elicited by inverse agonists are partially insensitive to HDAC inhibition. This raises the question how PPARβ/δ represses transcription mechanistically. We show that the PPARβ/δ inverse agonist PT-S264 impairs transcription initiation by decreasing recruitment of activating Mediator subunits, RNA polymerase II, and TFIIB, but not of TFIIA, to the ANGPTL4 promoter. Mass spectrometry identifies NCOR as the main PT-S264-dependent interactor of PPARβ/δ. Reconstitution of knockout cells with PPARβ/δ mutants deficient in basal repression results in diminished recruitment of NCOR, SMRT, and HDAC3 to PPAR target genes, while occupancy by RNA polymerase II is increased. PT-S264 restores binding of NCOR, SMRT, and HDAC3 to the mutants, resulting in reduced polymerase II occupancy. Our findings corroborate deacetylase-dependent and -independent repressive functions of HDAC3-containing complexes, which act in parallel to downregulate transcription.


Endocrinology ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 151 (4) ◽  
pp. 1409-1417 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele N. Washington ◽  
Nancy L. Weigel

Vitamin D receptor (VDR) agonists have been shown to reduce the growth of several prostate cancer cell lines. However, the effects of VDR activation have not been examined in the presence of the recently identified androgen-regulated TMPRSS2:ERG gene fusions, which occur in a high percentage of prostate cancers and play a role in growth and invasiveness. In a previous microarray study, we found that VDR activation induces TMPRSS2 expression in LNCaP prostate cancer cells. Here we show that the natural VDR agonist 1α,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 and its synthetic analog EB1089 increase expression of TMPRSS2:ERG mRNA in VCaP prostate cancer cells; this results in increased ETS-related gene (ERG) protein expression and ERG activity as demonstrated by an increase in the ERG target gene CACNA1D. In VCaP cells, we were not able to prevent EB1089-mediated TMPRSS2:ERG induction with an androgen receptor antagonist, Casodex, although in LNCaP cells, as reported for some other common androgen receptor and VDR target genes, Casodex reduces EB1089-mediated induction of TMPRSS2. However, despite inducing the fusion gene, VDR agonists reduce VCaP cell growth and expression of the ERG target gene c-Myc, a critical factor in VDR-mediated growth inhibition. Thus, the beneficial effects of VDR agonist treatment override some of the negative effects of ERG induction, although others remain to be tested.


2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (12) ◽  
pp. 2281-2291 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria R. Kelly ◽  
Bin Xu ◽  
Rork Kuick ◽  
Ronald J. Koenig ◽  
Gary D. Hammer

Abstract Dax1 (Nr0b1) is an atypical orphan nuclear receptor that has recently been shown to play a role in mouse embryonic stem (mES) cell pluripotency. Here we describe a mechanism by which Dax1 maintains pluripotency. In steroidogenic cells, Dax1 protein interacts with the NR5A nuclear receptor steroidogenic factor 1 (Nr5a1) to inhibit transcription of target genes. In mES cells, liver receptor homolog 1 (LRH-1, Nr5a2), the other NR5A family member, is expressed, and LRH-1 has been shown to interact with Dax1. We demonstrate by coimmunoprecipitation that Dax1 is, indeed, able to form a complex with LRH-1 in mES cells. Because Dax1 was historically characterized as an inhibitor of steroidogenic factor 1-mediated transcriptional activation, we hypothesized that Dax1 would inhibit LRH-1 action in mES cells. Therefore, we examined the effect of Dax1 on the LRH-1-mediated activation of the critical ES cell factor Oct4 (Pou5f1). Chromatin immunoprecipitation localized Dax1 to the Oct4 promoter at the LRH-1 binding site, and luciferase assays together with Dax1 overexpression and knockdown experiments revealed that, rather than repress, Dax1 accentuated LRH-1-mediated activation of the Oct4 gene. Similar to our previously published studies that defined the RNA coactivator steroid receptor RNA activator as the critical mediator of Dax1 coactivation function, Dax1 augmentation of LRH-1-mediated Oct4 activation is dependent upon steroid receptor RNA activator. Finally, utilizing published chromatin immunoprecipitation data of whole-genome binding sites of LRH-1 and Dax1, we show that LRH-1 and Dax1 commonly colocalize at 288 genes (43% of LRH-1 target genes), many of which are involved in mES cell pluripotency. Thus, our results indicate that Dax1 plays an important role in the maintenance of pluripotency in mES cells through interaction with LRH-1 and transcriptional activation of Oct4 and other genes.


2003 ◽  
Vol 23 (22) ◽  
pp. 7947-7956 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiangming Luo ◽  
Robert Sladek ◽  
Julie Carrier ◽  
Jo-Ann Bader ◽  
Denis Richard ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The estrogen-related receptor α (ERRα) is an orphan member of the superfamily of nuclear hormone receptors expressed in tissues that preferentially metabolize fatty acids. Despite the molecular characterization of ERRα and identification of target genes, determination of its physiological function has been hampered by the lack of a natural ligand. To further understand the in vivo function of ERRα, we generated and analyzed Estrra-null (ERRα−/−) mutant mice. Here we show that ERRα−/− mice are viable, fertile and display no gross anatomical alterations, with the exception of reduced body weight and peripheral fat deposits. No significant changes in food consumption and energy expenditure or serum biochemistry parameters were observed in the mutant animals. However, the mutant animals are resistant to a high-fat diet-induced obesity. Importantly, DNA microarray analysis of gene expression in adipose tissue demonstrates altered regulation of several enzymes involved in lipid, eicosanoid, and steroid synthesis, suggesting that the loss of ERRα might interfere with other nuclear receptor signaling pathways. In addition, the microarray study shows alteration in the expression of genes regulating adipogenesis as well as energy metabolism. In agreement with these findings, metabolic studies showed reduced lipogenesis in adipose tissues. This study suggests that ERRα functions as a metabolic regulator and that the ERRα−/− mice provide a novel model for the investigation of metabolic regulation by nuclear receptors.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document