Subbalakshmi Ayalur Raghu, Kundnani Deepali, Biswas Kuheli, Ghosh Anandamohan, Hanash Samir M, Tripathi Satyendra C, Jolly Mohit Kumar
Centre for BioSystems Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, India.
Department of Clinical Cancer Prevention, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, United States.
Front Oncol. 2020 Sep 8;10:553342. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2020.553342. eCollection 2020.
Metastasis remains the cause of over 90% of cancer-related deaths. Cells undergoing metastasis use phenotypic plasticity to adapt to their changing environmental conditions and avoid therapy and immune response. Reversible transitions between epithelial and mesenchymal phenotypes - epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and its reverse mesenchymal-epithelial transition (MET) - form a key axis of phenotypic plasticity during metastasis and therapy resistance. Recent studies have shown that the cells undergoing EMT/MET can attain one or more hybrid epithelial/mesenchymal (E/M) phenotypes, the process of which is termed as partial EMT/MET. Cells in hybrid E/M phenotype(s) can be more aggressive than those in either epithelial or mesenchymal state. Thus, it is crucial to identify the factors and regulatory networks enabling such hybrid E/M phenotypes. Here, employing an integrated computational-experimental approach, we show that the transcription factor nuclear factor of activated T-cell (NFATc) can inhibit the process of complete EMT, thus stabilizing the hybrid E/M phenotype. It increases the range of parameters enabling the existence of a hybrid E/M phenotype, thus behaving as a phenotypic stability factor (PSF). However, unlike previously identified PSFs, it does not increase the mean residence time of the cells in hybrid E/M phenotypes, as shown by stochastic simulations; rather it enables the co-existence of epithelial, mesenchymal and hybrid E/M phenotypes and transitions among them. Clinical data suggests the effect of NFATc on patient survival in a tissue-specific or context-dependent manner. Together, our results indicate that NFATc behaves as a non-canonical PSF for a hybrid E/M phenotype.
转移仍然是90%以上癌症相关死亡的原因。发生转移的细胞利用表型可塑性来适应不断变化的环境条件,并逃避治疗和免疫反应。上皮和间充质表型之间的可逆转变——上皮-间充质转化(EMT)及其逆向的间充质-上皮转化(MET)——在转移和治疗耐药过程中形成了表型可塑性的关键轴。最近的研究表明,经历EMT/MET的细胞可以获得一种或多种混合上皮/间充质(E/M)表型,这一过程被称为部分EMT/MET。处于混合E/M表型的细胞可能比处于上皮或间充质状态的细胞更具侵袭性。因此,识别促成这种混合E/M表型的因素和调控网络至关重要。在这里,我们采用综合计算-实验方法表明,转录因子活化T细胞核因子(NFATc)可以抑制完全EMT的过程,从而稳定混合E/M表型。它增加了使混合E/M表型得以存在的参数范围,因此表现为一种表型稳定性因子(PSF)。然而,与先前鉴定的PSF不同,随机模拟显示它不会增加细胞在混合E/M表型中的平均停留时间;相反,它使上皮、间充质和混合E/M表型能够共存并在它们之间转换。临床数据表明NFATc以组织特异性或背景依赖性方式影响患者生存。总之,我们的结果表明NFATc作为一种非典型的PSF作用于混合E/M表型。