Stress-activated kinase pathway alteration is a frequent event in bladder cancer

The comprehensive analysis based study of perfluorinated compounds-Environmental explanation of bladder cancer progression

Perfluorinated compounds are emerging organic pollutants widely used in building materials, textiles, and electric equipment. Herein, silico analysis was conducted using bioinformatics approach to assess the potential relationship between bladder cancer and perfluorinated compounds. Transcriptome profiles and data of perfluorinated compounds were obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and the Genotype-Tissue Expression and Comparative Toxicogenomics databases. Gene Ontology (GO9 and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analyses showed that interactive genes were mainly enriched in bladder cancer (BC). Transcriptome profiles were used to verify the expression of m6A-related genes at the mRNA and protein levels. Most m6A-related genes predicted BC prognosis. Survival analysis and ROC curves demonstrated that the expression levels of m6A-related genes were associated with BC prognosis. Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) significantly increased the cell proliferation ability and promoted cell invasion capacity. In addition, PFOA significantly increased the cell viability and cell invasion capacity of T24 and BIU-87 cell lines compared with the control group. Taken together, these results show that perfluorinated compounds could promote BC progression. DATA AVAILABILITY: Data and materials are available within the manuscript.

Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor Family Inhibition Identifies P38 Mitogen-activated Protein Kinase as a Potential Therapeutic Target in Bladder Cancer

OBJECTIVE

To investigate perturbations in downstream signaling pathway activation and potential resistance mechanisms to epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) or human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) inhibition in cell line models of bladder cancer.

METHODS

We undertook a structured screening approach by phosphokinase array, followed by validation steps, to detect activated downstream signaling pathway nodes after therapeutic inhibition of EGFR or HER2 in bladder cancer cell lines.

RESULTS

Erlotinib treatment of RT112 cells induced phosphorylation of 9 activated phosphoprotein targets (p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase [MAPK] [Thr180/Tyr182], GSK-3α/β [Ser21/9], MEK1/2 [Ser218/222, Ser222/226], Akt (protein kinase B) [Ser473], TOR [target of rapamycin] [Ser2448], Src [Tyr419], p27 [Thr198], p27 [Thr157], and PLCγ-1 [Tyr783]), whereas STAT4 (signal transducer and activator of transcription 4) (Tyr693) phosphorylation was reduced. Of these, p38 MAPK phosphorylation was confirmed to occur in response to inhibition of either EGFR or HER2 signaling through multiple validation steps, including differing bladder cancer cell lines (RT112, UM-UC-3, and T24) and methods of receptor pathway inhibition (erlotinib, lapatinib, and siRNA depletion of EGFR or HER2). Chemical inhibition of p38 MAPK with SB203580 led to inhibition of proliferation in RT112, UM-UC-3, and T24 cell lines (IC₅₀ 20.85, 76.78, and 79.12 µM, respectively). Fractional effect analyses indicated a synergistic interaction for inhibition of cell proliferation when combining SB203580 with lapatinib.

CONCLUSION

p38 MAPK is a potential therapeutic target in bladder cancer and this strategy warrants further development in this disease. It may also allow combination therapy strategies to be developed in conjunction with EGFR or HER2 inhibition.

The marine triterpene glycoside frondoside A induces p53-independent apoptosis and inhibits autophagy in urothelial carcinoma cells

Background

Advanced urothelial carcinomas represent a considerable clinical challenge as they are difficult to treat. Platinum-based combination regimens obtain response rates ranging from 40 to 70% in first-line therapy of advanced urothelial carcinoma. In the majority of cases, however, the duration of these responses is limited, and when progression occurs, the outcome is generally poor. Therefore, novel therapeutic strategies are urgently needed. The purpose of the current research is to investigate the anticancer effects and the mode of action of the marine triterpene glycoside frondoside A in p53-wild type and p53-deficient human urothelial carcinoma cells.

Methods

Activity of frondoside A was examined in the human urothelial carcinoma cell lines RT112, RT4, HT-1197, TCC-SUP, T-24, and 486p. Effects of frondoside A on cell viability, either alone or in combination with standard cytotoxic agents were investigated, and synergistic effects were analyzed. Pro-apoptotic activity was assessed by Western blotting and FACS, alone and in combination with a caspases-inhibitor. The impact of functional p53 was investigated by siRNA gene silencing and the p53 inhibitor pifithrin-α. Effects on autophagy were studied using LC3B-I/II and SQSTM/p62 as markers. The unpaired Student’s t-test was used for comparison of the data sets.

Results

Frondoside A shows high cytotoxicity in urothelial carcinoma cells with IC_50s ranging from 0.55 to 2.33 μM while higher concentrations of cisplatin are required for comparable effects (IC₅₀ = 2.03 ~ 5.88 μM). Induction of apoptosis by frondoside A was associated with the regulation of several pro-apoptotic factors, like caspase-3, -8, and -9, PARP, Bax, p21, DNA fragmentation, and externalization of phosphatidylserine. Remarkably, inhibition of p53 by gene silencing or pifithrin-α pretreatment, as well as caspase inhibition, did not suppress apoptotic activity of frondoside A, while cisplatin activity, in contrast, was significantly decreased. Frondoside A inhibited pro-survival autophagy, a known mechanism of drug resistance in urothelial carcinoma and showed synergistic activity with cisplatin and gemcitabine.

Conclusions

A unique combination of properties makes marine compound frondoside A a promising candidate for the treatment of human urothelial carcinomas.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12885-017-3085-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Inflammatory-Related Genetic Variants in Non-Muscle-Invasive Bladder Cancer Prognosis: A Multimarker Bayesian Assessment

BACKGROUND

Increasing evidence points to the role of tumor immunologic environment on urothelial bladder cancer prognosis. This effect might be partly dependent on the host genetic context. We evaluated the association of SNPs in inflammation-related genes with non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) risk-of-recurrence and risk-of-progression.

METHODS

We considered 822 NMIBC included in the SBC/EPICURO Study followed-up >10 years. We selected 1,679 SNPs belonging to 251 inflammatory genes. The association of SNPs with risk-of-recurrence and risk-of-progression was assessed using Cox regression single-marker (SMM) and multimarker methods (MMM) Bayes A and Bayesian LASSO. Discriminative abilities of the models were calculated using the c index and validated with bootstrap cross-validation procedures.

RESULTS

While no SNP was found to be associated with risk-of-recurrence using SMM, three SNPs in TNIP1, CD5, and JAK3 showed very strong association with posterior probabilities >90% using MMM. Regarding risk-of-progression, one SNP in CD3G was significantly associated using SMM (HR, 2.69; P = 1.55 × 10(-5)) and two SNPs in MASP1 and AIRE, showed a posterior probability ≥80% with MMM. Validated discriminative abilities of the models without and with the SNPs were 58.4% versus 60.5% and 72.1% versus 72.8% for risk-of-recurrence and risk-of-progression, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

Using innovative analytic approaches, we demonstrated that SNPs in inflammatory-related genes were associated with NMIBC prognosis and that they improve the discriminative ability of prognostic clinical models for NMIBC.

IMPACT

This study provides proof of concept for the joint effect of genetic variants in improving the discriminative ability of clinical prognostic models. The approach may be extended to other diseases. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev; 25(7); 1144-50. ©2016 AACR.

TRAM-Derived Decoy Peptides inhibits the inflammatory response in mouse mammary epithelial cells and a mastitis model in mice

It has been proved that TRAM-Derived Decoy peptides have anti-inflammatory properties. In this study, we synthesized a TRAM-Derived decoy peptide (TM6), belongs to TRAM TIR domain, of which sequence is "N"-RQIKIWFQNRRMKWK, KENFLRDTWCNFQFY-"C" and evaluated the effects of TM6 on lipopolysaccharide-induced mastitis in mice. In vivo, LPS-induced mice mastitis model was established by injection of LPS through the duct of mammary gland. TM6 was injected 1h before or after LPS treatment. In vitro, primary mouse mammary epithelial cells were used to investigate the effects of TM6 on LPS-induced inflammatory responses. The results showed that TM6 inhibited LPS-induced mammary gland histopathologic changes, MPO activity, and TNF-α, IL-1β and IL-6 production in mice. In vitro, TM6 significantly inhibited LPS-induced TNF-α and IL-6 production, as well as NF-κB and MAPKs activation. In conclusion, this study demonstrated that TM6 had protective effects on LPS-mastitis and may be a promising therapeutic reagent for mastitis treatment.

Multiple mechanisms mediate resistance to sorafenib in urothelial cancer

Genetic and epigenetic changes in the mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling render urothelial cancer a potential target for tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) treatment. However, clinical trials of several TKIs failed to prove efficacy. In this context, we investigated changes in MAPK signaling activity, downstream apoptotic regulators and changes in cell cycle distribution in different urothelial cancer cell lines (UCCs) upon treatment with the multikinase inhibitor sorafenib. None of the classical sorafenib targets (vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 1/-receptor 2, VEGFR1/-R2; platelet-derived growth factor receptor α/-receptor β, PDGFR-α/-β; c-KIT) was expressed at significant levels leaving RAF proteins as its likely molecular target. Low sorafenib concentrations paradoxically increased cell viability, whereas higher concentrations induced G1 arrest and eventually apoptosis. MAPK signaling remained partly active after sorafenib treatment, especially in T24 cells with an oncogenic HRAS mutation. AKT phosphorylation was increased, suggesting compensatory activation of the phosphatidylinositol-3-kinase (PI3K) pathway. Sorafenib regularly down regulated the anti-apoptotic myeloid cell leukemia 1 (Mcl-1) protein, but combinatorial treatment with ABT-737 targeting other B-cell lymphoma 2 (Bcl-2) family proteins did not result in synergistic effects. In summary, efficacy of sorafenib in urothelial cancer cell lines appears hampered by limited effects on MAPK signaling, crosstalk with further cancer pathways and an anti-apoptotic state of UCCs. These observations may account for the lack of efficacy of sorafenib in clinical trials and should be considered more broadly in the development of signaling pathway inhibitors for drug therapy in urothelial carcinoma.

Polymorphism of inflammatory genes and arsenic methylation capacity are associated with urothelial carcinoma

Chronic exposure to arsenic can generate reactive oxidative species, which can induce certain proinflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6) and interleukin-8 (IL-8). TNF-α, IL-6 and IL-8 have been shown to be involved in the development and progression of various cancers, including bladder cancer. This study aimed to investigate the joint effect of the polymorphism of TNF-α -308 G/A, IL-6 -174 G/C, IL-8 -251 T/A and urinary arsenic profiles on urothelial carcinoma (UC) risk. This study evaluated 300 pathologically-confirmed cases of UC and 594 cancer-free controls. Urinary arsenic species were detected using high-performance liquid chromatography-linked hydride generator and atomic absorption spectrometry. The polymorphism of TNF-α -308 G/A, IL-6 -174 G/C and IL-8 -251 T/A was determined using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism. The joint effects on UC risk were estimated by odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals using unconditional logistic regression. We found that the TNF-α -308 A/A and IL-8 -251 T/T polymorphisms were significantly associated with UC. Moreover, significant dose-response joint effect of TNF-α -308 A/A or IL-8 -251 T/T genotypes and arsenic methylation indices were seen to affect UC risk. The present results also showed a significant increase in UC risk in subjects with the IL-8 -251 T/T genotype for each SD increase in urinary total arsenic and MMA%. In contrast, a significant decrease in UC risk was found in subjects who carried the IL-8 -251 T/T genotype for each SD increase in DMA%.