cPLA2-interacting protein, PLIP, causes apoptosis and decreases G1 phase in mesangial cells

Stress-induced cell-cycle activation in Tip60 haploinsufficient adult cardiomyocytes

Background

Tat-interactive protein 60 (Tip60) is a member of the MYST family of histone acetyltransferases. Studies using cultured cells have shown that Tip60 has various functions including DNA repair, apoptosis and cell-cycle regulation. We globally ablated the Tip60 gene (Htatip), observing that Tip60-null embryos die at the blastocyst stage (Hu et al. Dev.Dyn.238:2912;2009). Although adult heterozygous (Tip60^+/−) mice reproduce normally without a haploinsufficient phenotype, stress caused by Myc over-expression induced B-cell lymphoma in Tip60^+/− adults, suggesting that Tip60 is a tumor suppressor (Gorrini et al. Nature 448:1063;2007). These findings prompted assessment of whether Tip60, alternative splicing of which generates two predominant isoforms termed Tip60α and Tip60β, functions to suppress the cell-cycle in adult cardiomyocytes.

Methodology/Principal Findings

Western blotting revealed that Tip60α is the predominant Tip60 isoprotein in the embryonic heart, transitioning at neonatal stages to Tip60β, which is the only isoprotein in the adult heart wherein it is highly enriched. Over-expression of Tip60β, but not Tip60α, inhibited cell proliferation in NIH3T3 cells; and, Tip60-haploinsufficient cultured neonatal cardiomyocytes exhibited increased cell-cycle activity. To address whether Tip60β suppresses the cardiomyocyte cell-cycle in the adult heart, hypertrophic stress was induced in Tip60^+/+ and Tip^+/− littermates via two methods, Myc over-expression and aortic banding. Based on immunostaining cell-cycle markers and western blotting cyclin D, stress increased cardiomyocyte cell-cycle mobilization in Tip60^+/− hearts, in comparison with Tip60^+/+ littermates. Aortic-banded Tip60^+/− hearts also exhibited significantly decreased apoptosis.

Conclusions/Significance

These findings provide evidence that Tip60 may function in a tumor suppressor pathway(s) to maintain adult cardiomyocytes in replicative senescence.

Homozygous disruption of the Tip60 gene causes early embryonic lethality

Tat-interactive protein 60 (Tip60) is a member of the MYST family, proteins of which are related by an atypical histone acetyltransferase (HAT) domain. Although Tip60 has been implicated in cellular activities including DNA repair, apoptosis, and transcriptional regulation, its function during embryonic development is unknown. We ablated the Tip60 gene (Htatip) from the mouse by replacing exons 1-9 with a neomycin resistance cassette. Development and reproduction of wild-type and heterozygous animals were normal. However, homozygous ablation of the Tip60 gene caused embryolethality near the blastocyst stage of development, as evidenced by inability of cells in Tip60-null blastocysts to hatch and survive in culture. Monitoring cell proliferation and death by detecting EdU-substituted DNA and TUNEL labeling revealed suppression of cell proliferation concomitant with increased cell death as Tip60-null cells attempted to hatch from blastocysts. These findings indicate that Tip60 is essential for cellular survival during the blastocyst-gastrula transition of embryogenesis.

Expression Analysis of cPLA2 Alpha Interacting TIP60 in Diabetic KKAy and Non-Diabetic C57BL Wild-Type Mice: No Impact of Transient and Stable TIP60 Overexpression on Glucose-Stimulated Insulin Secretion in Pancreatic Beta-Cells

In the present study we investigate the expression levels of cytosolic phospholipase A2 alpha (cPLA2alpha) interacting histone acetyl transferase proteins TIP60alpha and TIP60beta in non-diabetic C57BL wild-type mice and obese type 2 diabetic KKAy model mice. The aim was to test our hypothesis that TIP60 plays a regulatory role in glucose-stimulated insulin secretion from pancreatic beta-cells.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Ten obese diabetic KKAy mice and ten non-diabetic C57BL mice were fed a standard chow diet. After nine weeks, islet RNA was purified and used to measure TIP60 expression. We investigated the effect of TIP60alpha and TIP60beta on glucose-stimulated insulin secretion by transient and stable overexpression in the pancreatic mouse beta-cell line MIN6 and the rat beta-cell line INS-1E.

RESULTS

We found that non-diabetic C57BL mice and diabetic KKAy mice have the same level of both the alpha and beta splice forms of TIP60. Furthermore, we demonstrated that transient and stable expression of TIP60 in INS-1E cells affects neither glucose-stimulated insulin secretion, insulin output nor cell insulin content. Also susceptibility to developing gluco-toxicity was unaffected.

CONCLUSION

TIP60 over-expression does not affect glucose stimulated insulin secretion, insulin content or abnormal beta-cell function during glucotoxicity.

Tip60 protein isoforms and altered function in skin and tumors that overexpress ornithine decarboxylase

Elevated expression of ornithine decarboxylase (ODC) and increased synthesis of polyamines are hallmarks of epithelial tumorigenesis. The skin and tumors of K6/ODC and ODC/Ras transgenic mice, in which overexpression of ODC has been targeted to hair follicles, were found to exhibit intrinsically high histone acetyltransferase (HAT) activity. We identified Tip60 as a candidate enzyme for contributing significantly to this abnormally high HAT activity. Compared with normal littermate controls, the levels of Tip60 protein and an alternative splice variant Tip53 were found to be greater in K6/ODC mouse skin. Furthermore, skin tumors that spontaneously develop in ODC/Ras bigenic mice typically have substantially more Tip60 protein than adjacent non-tumor-bearing skin and exhibit a unique pattern of Tip60 size variants and chemically modified protein isoforms. Steady-state Tip60 and Tip53 mRNA levels were not affected in ODC-overexpressing skin and tumors, implying novel posttranscriptional regulation by polyamines. Given the diverse roles of Tip60, the overabundance of Tip60 protein is predicted to have biological consequences. Compared with normal littermate skin, we detected altered association of Tip60 with E2F1 and a subset of newly identified Tip60-interacting transcription factors in ODC transgenic mouse skin and tumors. E2F1 was shown to be bound in greater amounts to up-regulated target genes in ODC-overexpressing skin. Thus, up-regulation of Tip60 protein, influencing the expression of Tip60-regulated genes, could play a contributing role in polyamine-mediated tumor promotion. (