Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts: Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound   Target Concepts: Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound

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Query: EC:2.7.10.1 (ERK)
95,504 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Two collagen receptors, integrins alpha1beta1 and alpha2beta1, can regulate distinct functions in cells. Ligation of alpha1beta1, unlike alpha2beta1, has been shown to result in recruitment of Shc and activation of the Ras/ERK pathway. To identify the downstream signaling molecules activated by alpha2beta1 integrin, we have overexpressed wild-type alpha2, or chimeric alpha2 subunit with alpha1 integrin cytoplasmic domain in human osteosarcoma cells (Saos-2) lacking endogenous alpha2beta1. The chimeric alpha2/alpha1 chain formed a functional heterodimer with beta1. In contrast to alpha2/alpha1 chimera, forced expression of alpha2 integrin resulted in upregulation of alpha1 (I) collagen gene transcription in response to three-dimensional collagen, indicating that the cytoplasmic domain of alpha2 integrin was required for signaling. Furthermore, signals mediated by alpha2beta1 integrin specifically activated the p38alpha isoform, and selective p38 inhibitors blocked upregulation of collagen gene transcription. Dominant negative mutants of Cdc42, MKK3, and MKK4 prevented alpha2beta1 integrin-mediated activation of p38alpha. RhoA had also some inhibitory effect, whereas dominant negative Rac was not effective. Our findings show the isoform-specific activation of p38 by alpha2beta1 integrin ligation and identify Cdc42, MKK3, and MKK4 as possible downstream effectors. These observations reveal a novel signaling mechanism of alpha2beta1 integrin that is distinct from ones previously described for other integrins.
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PMID:Integrin alpha2beta1 mediates isoform-specific activation of p38 and upregulation of collagen gene transcription by a mechanism involving the alpha2 cytoplasmic tail. 1052 44

Phospholipase D (PLD), a signal-transducing membrane-associated enzyme, is implicated in diverse processes including apoptosis, ERK activation, and glucose transport. Prior studies have identified specific PLD activators and repressors that directly regulate its enzymatic activity. Using two-hybrid screens, we have identified PEA-15 as a PLD interactor that unexpectedly functions to alter its level of expression. PEA-15 is a widely expressed death effector domain-containing phosphoprotein involved in signal transduction, apoptosis, ERK activation, and glucose transport. The PLD1-interacting site on PEA-15 consists of part of the death effector domain domain plus additional C-terminal flanking sequences, whereas the PEA-15-interacting site on PLD1 overlaps the previously identified RhoA-interacting site. PEA-15 did not affect basal or stimulated in vitro PLD1 enzymatic activation. However, co-expression of PEA-15 increased levels of PLD1 activity. This increased activation correlated with higher PLD1 protein expression levels, as marked by faster accumulation and longer persistence of PLD1 when PEA-15 was present. PEA-15 similarly increased protein expressions level of PLD2 and co-immunoprecipitated with it. These results suggest that PEA-15 may stabilize PLD or act as a PLD chaperone. The common involvement of PEA-15 and PLD in apoptosis, ERK activation, and glucose transport additionally suggests functional significance.
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PMID:Regulation of expression of phospholipase D1 and D2 by PEA-15, a novel protein that interacts with them. 1092 29

A recently reported new member of the Vav family proteins, Vav3 has been identified as a Ros receptor protein tyrosine kinase (RPTK) interacting protein by yeast two-hybrid screening. Northern analysis shows that Vav3 has a broad tissue expression profile that is distinct from those of Vav and Vav2. Two species of Vav3 transcripts, 3.4 and 5.4 kb, were detected with a differential expression pattern in various tissues. Transient expression of Vav in 293T and NIH 3T3 cells demonstrated that ligand stimulation of several RPTKs (epidermal growth factor receptor [EGFR], Ros, insulin receptor [IR], and insulin-like growth factor I receptor [IGFR]) led to tyrosine phosphorylation of Vav3 and its association with the receptors as well as their downstream signaling molecules, including Shc, Grb2, phospholipase C (PLC-gamma), and phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase. In vitro binding assays using glutathione S-transferase-fusion polypeptides containing the GTPase-binding domains of Rok-alpha, Pak, or Ack revealed that overexpression of Vav3 in NIH 3T3 cells resulted in the activation of Rac-1 and Cdc42 whereas a deletion mutant lacking the N-terminal calponin homology and acidic region domains activated RhoA and Rac-1 but lost the ability to activate Cdc42. Vav3 induced marked membrane ruffles and microspikes in NIH 3T3 cells, while the N-terminal truncation mutants of Vav3 significantly enhanced membrane ruffle formation but had a reduced ability to induce microspikes. Activation of IR further enhanced the ability of Vav3 to induce membrane ruffles, but IGFR activation specifically promoted Vav3-mediated microspike formation. N-terminal truncation of Vav3 activated its transforming potential, as measured by focus-formation assays. We conclude that Vav3 mediates RPTK signaling and regulates GTPase activity, its native and mutant forms are able to modulate cell morphology, and it has the potential to induce cell transformation.
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PMID:Vav3 mediates receptor protein tyrosine kinase signaling, regulates GTPase activity, modulates cell morphology, and induces cell transformation. 1109 73

Activation of multiple signaling pathways is required to trigger the full spectrum of in vitro and in vivo phenotypic traits associated with neoplastic transformation by oncogenic Ras. To determine which of these pathways are important for N-ras tumorigenesis in human cancer cells and also to investigate the possibility of cross talk among the pathways, we have utilized a human fibrosarcoma cell line (HT1080), which contains an endogenous mutated allele of the N-ras gene, and its derivative (MCH603c8), which lacks the mutant N-ras allele. We have stably transfected MCH603c8 and HT1080 cells with activating or dominant-negative mutant cDNAs, respectively, of various components of the Raf, Rac, and RhoA pathways. In previous studies with these cell lines we showed that loss of mutant Ras function results in dramatic changes in the in vitro phenotypic traits and conversion to a weakly tumorigenic phenotype in vivo. We report here that only overexpression of activated MEK contributed significantly to the conversion of MCH603c8 cells to an aggressive tumorigenic phenotype. Furthermore, we have demonstrated that blocking the constitutive activation of the Raf-MEK, Rac, or RhoA pathway alone is not sufficient to block the aggressive tumorigenic phenotype of HT1080, despite affecting a number of in vitro-transformed phenotypic traits. We have also demonstrated the possibility of bidirectional cross talk between the Raf-MEK-ERK pathway and the Rac-JNK or RhoA pathway. Finally, overexpression of activated MEK in MCH603c8 cells appears to result in the activation of an as-yet-unidentified target(s) that is critical for the aggressive tumorigenic phenotype.
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PMID:Dissection of Ras-dependent signaling pathways controlling aggressive tumor growth of human fibrosarcoma cells: evidence for a potential novel pathway. 1109 80

Transformation by oncogenic Ras requires the function of the Rho family GTPases. We find that Ras-transformed cells have elevated levels of RhoA-GTP, which functions to inhibit the expression of the cell cycle inhibitor p21/Waf1. These high levels of Rho-GTP are not a direct consequence of Ras signalling but are selected for in response to sustained ERK-MAP kinase signalling. While the elevated levels of Rho-GTP control the level of p21/Waf, they no longer regulate the formation of actin stress fibres in transformed cells. We show that the sustained ERK-MAP kinase signalling resulting from transformation by oncogenic Ras down-regulates ROCK1 and Rho-kinase, two Rho effectors required for actin stress fibre formation. The repression of Rho- dependent stress fibre formation by ERK-MAP kinase signalling contributes to the increased motility of Ras-transformed fibroblasts. Overexpression of the ROCK target LIM kinase restores actin stress fibres and inhibits the motility of Ras-transformed fibroblasts. We propose a model in which Ras and Rho signalling pathways cross-talk to promote signalling pathways favouring transformation.
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PMID:Cross-talk between Ras and Rho signalling pathways in transformation favours proliferation and increased motility. 1117 20

The present study was performed in four renal cell lines to evaluate their capability to: (1) produce and express transforming growth factor alpha (TGFalpha), its respective receptor, the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFr) and the small G protein, RhoA, and (2) exhibit morphogenetic properties when grown on Matri-cell substrates. The cell lines were derived from normal (Madin-Darby canine kidney cells), embryonic (SK-NEP-1 and 293 cells), and cancerous (human renal adenocarcinoma cells) kidneys. TGFalpha messenger ribonucleic acid, evaluated by a nonradioactive in situ hybridization technique, was found to be expressed in all the cell lines. Large amounts of TGFalpha peptide were observed in all four cell lines, while EGFr was highly expressed only in cancerous ACHN and embryonic-tumor SK-NEP-1 cells. RhoA peptide was found in appreciable amounts in SK-NEP-1 and 293 cells (compared to the other two cell lines). The morphogenetic properties of the four cell lines were assessed, by culturing them on Matri-cell dishes: SK-NEP-1 cells alone were found to grow in three-dimensional structures forming clusters and worm-like cellular aggregates. This feature was displayed by SK-NEP-1 cells but not by the other three cell lines, and may be connected with the contemporary presence of RhoA, EGFr, and TGFalpha found in significant amounts only in the SK-NEP-1 cell line.
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PMID:Renal cell cultures for the study of growth factor interactions underlying kidney organogenesis. 1140 92

Ras plays an essential role in activation of Raf kinase which is directly responsible for activation of the MEK-ERK kinase pathway. A direct protein-protein interaction between Ras and the N-terminal regulatory domain of Raf is critical for Raf activation. However, association with Ras is not sufficient to activate Raf in vitro, indicating that Ras must activate some other biochemical events leading to activation of Raf. We have observed that RasV12Y32F and RasV12T35S mutants fail to activate Raf, yet retain the ability to interact with Raf. In this report, we showed that RasV12Y32F and RasV12T35S can cooperate with members of the Rho family GTPases to activate Raf while alone the Rho family GTPase is not effective in Raf activation. A dominant negative mutant of Rac or RhoA can block Raf activation by Ras. The effect of Rac or Cdc42 can be substituted by the Pak kinase, which is a direct downstream target of Rac/Cdc42. Furthermore, expression of a kinase inactive mutant of Pak or the N-terminal inhibitory domain of Pak1 can block the effect of Rac or Cdc42. In contrast, Pak appears to play no direct role in relaying the signal from RhoA to Raf, indicating that RhoA utilizes a different mechanism than Rac/Cdc42. Membrane-associated but not cytoplasmic Raf can be activated by Rac or RhoA. Our data support a model by which the Rho family small GTPases play an important role to mediate the activation of Raf by Ras. Ras, at least, has two distinct functions in Raf activation, recruitment of Raf to the plasma membrane by direct binding and stimulation of Raf activating kinases via the Rho family GTPases.
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PMID:Function of the Rho family GTPases in Ras-stimulated Raf activation. 1145 31

Vascular permeability factor/vascular endothelial growth factor (VPF/VEGF) promotes its function primarily by activating two receptor tyrosine kinases, Flt-1 (VEGFR-1) and KDR (VEGFR-2). Recently, it has been shown that KDR is responsible for VPF/VEGF-stimulated endothelial cell (EC) proliferation and migration, whereas Flt-1 activation down-modulates KDR-mediated EC proliferation. Although KDR-mediated EC proliferation and migration have been extensively studied, much less is known about Flt-1-mediated antiproliferation. Here, we demonstrate that Flt-1-mediated antiproliferative activity can be blocked completely by the dominant negative mutant of CDC42 (CDC42-17N) and partially by a Rac1 dominant negative mutant (Rac1-17N) but is not affected by a RhoA dominant negative mutant (RhoA-19N). Both CDC42-17N and Rac1-17N increase the intracellular Ca(2+) mobilization in response to VPF/VEGF but have no effect on KDR and MAPK phosphorylation. Using the chimeric-receptor EGLT in which the extracellular domain of epidermal growth factor receptor was fused to the transmembrane and intracellular domains of Flt-1, we also demonstrate that CDC42 and Rac1 are activated by EGLT. Previously, we showed that phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase is required for Flt-1-mediated antiproliferative activity, but phospholipase C is not required. As expected, CDC42 and Rac1 activation mediated by EGLT can be completely inhibited by PI3K inhibitors, wortmannin and LY294002, and the p85 dominant negative mutant but not by either the phospholipase C inhibitor, or an intracellular Ca(2+) chilator BAPTA/AM. Surprisingly, pertussis toxin and overexpression of the free Gbetagamma-specific sequestering minigene hbetaARK1(495) also inhibit EGLT-mediated CDC42 and Rac1 activation completely. Moreover, pertussis toxin treatment also increases the intracellular Ca(2+) mobilization and inhibits the antiproliferation activity, thus suggesting that pertussis toxin-sensitive G proteins and the Gbetagamma subunits are involved in the signaling pathway of Flt-1 that down-regulates EC proliferation. Taken together, these results further expand our understanding of Flt-1-mediated antiproliferative activity in VPF/VEGF-stimulated endothelium.
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PMID:Flt-1-mediated down-regulation of endothelial cell proliferation through pertussis toxin-sensitive G proteins, beta gamma subunits, small GTPase CDC42, and partly by Rac-1. 1172 72

Binding of the urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) to its receptor activates diverse cell signaling pathways. How these signals are integrated so that cell physiology is altered remains unclear. In this study, we demonstrated that migration of MCF-7 breast cancer cells and HT-1080 fibrosarcoma cells on serum-coated surfaces is stimulated by agents that activate ERK, including uPA, epidermal growth factor, and constitutively active MEK1. The promigratory activity of these agents was entirely blocked not only by the MEK-specific antagonist PD098059, but also by antagonists of the Rho-Rho kinase pathway, including Y-27632 and dominant-negative RhoA (RhoA-N19). uPA did not significantly increase the level of GTP-bound RhoA, suggesting that the constitutive activity of the Rho-Rho kinase pathway may be sufficient to support ERK-stimulated cell migration. Paradoxically, Y-27632 and RhoA-N19 increased ERK phosphorylation in MCF-7 cells, providing further evidence that ERK activation alone does not promote cell migration when Rho kinase is antagonized. When MCF-7 cell migration was stimulated by ERK-independent processes such as expression of the beta(3) integrin subunit or changing the substratum to type I collagen, Y-27632 and RhoA-N19 failed to inhibit the response. This study supports a model in which the Ras-ERK and Rho-Rho kinase pathways cooperate to promote cell migration. Neutralizing either pathway is sufficient to block the response to agents that stimulate cell migration by activating ERK.
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PMID:Cooperativity between the Ras-ERK and Rho-Rho kinase pathways in urokinase-type plasminogen activator-stimulated cell migration. 1180 8

Geranylgeranylation of RhoA small G-protein is essential for its localization to cell membranes and for its biological functions. Many RhoA effects are mediated by its downstream effector RhoA kinase. The role of protein geranylgeranylation and the RhoA pathway in the regulation of endothelial cell survival has not been elucidated. The hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl (HMG)-CoA reductase inhibitor lovastatin depletes cellular pools of geranylgeranyl pyrophosphate and farnesol pyrophosphate and thereby inhibits both geranylgeranylation and farnesylation. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) were exposed to lovastatin (3 microm-30 microm) for 48 h, and cell death was quantitatively determined by cytoplasmic histone-associated DNA fragments as well as caspase-3 activity. The assays showed that lovastatin caused a dose-dependent endothelial cell death. The addition of geranylgeraniol, which restores geranylgeranylation, rescued HUVEC from apoptosis. The geranylgeranyltransferase inhibitor GGTI-298, but not the farnesyltransferase inhibitor FTI-277, induced apoptosis in HUVEC. Cell death was also induced by a blockade of RhoA function by exoenzyme C3. In addition, treatment of HUVEC with the RhoA kinase inhibitors Y-27632 and HA-1077 caused dose-dependent cell death. Y-27632 did not inhibit other well known survival pathways, such as NF-kappa B, ERK, and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase/Akt. However, there was an increase in p53 protein level concomitant with Y-27632-induced cell death. Unlike the apoptosis induced by TNF-alpha, which occurs only with inhibition of new protein synthesis, apoptosis induced by inhibitors of HMG-CoA reductase, geranylgeranyltransferase, or RhoA kinase was blocked by cycloheximide. Our data indicate that inhibition of protein geranylgeranylation and RhoA pathways induce apoptosis in HUVEC and that induction of p53 or other proapoptotic proteins is required for this process.
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PMID:Inhibition of protein geranylgeranylation and RhoA/RhoA kinase pathway induces apoptosis in human endothelial cells. 1183 65


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