Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UNIPROT:P04637 (p53)
 77,613 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

In pediatric solid tumors, such as neuroblastoma (NB), it has been reported that the frequency of TP53 gene alterations is lower than that in adult tumors, suggesting that other tumor suppressor genes may play more important roles in the development of pediatric solid tumors. The CHK2 gene, whose product is a checkpoint kinase that plays a central role in DNA damage response and acts upstream of TP53, has been found to be mutated in a subset of Li-Fraumeni syndrome without mutations of TP53 and in some other sporadic human tumors, earmarking this serine/threonine kinase as a candidate tumor suppressor gene. Thus, we analyzed the CHK2 gene to address whether it is a candidate tumor suppressor gene for pediatric solid tumors. We screened for mutations of the CHK2 gene in 25 NB, 8 rhbdomyosarcoma, 12 Ewing sarcoma, and 26 other pediatric solid tumor cell lines as well as 77 fresh tumors including two cases of multiple cancers. Using polymerase chain reaction-single-strand conformation polymorphism (PCR-SSCP) analysis and reverse transcriptase (RT)-PCR-SSCP followed by direct sequence analysis, we detected only one missense mutation (S505T) in one NB cell line and two silent mutations in one NB cell line and one NB fresh tumor, respectively. Through RT-PCR and subcloning analysis, we detected a similar expression of the CHK2 gene in all of the NB cell lines and fresh tumors; however, we identified at least three isoforms of the CHK2 gene, two of which have not been reported previously. These results suggest that aberrations of the CHK2 gene are rare in pediatric solid tumors.
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PMID:Aberrations of the CHK2 gene are rare in pediatric solid tumors. 1594 82

Death-associated protein kinase (DAPK) is a Ca(2+)/calmodulin-dependent serine/threonine kinase that is thought to mediate apoptosis. We previously showed that the kinase domain of DAPK is crucial for the induction of renal tubular cell apoptosis in chronic obstructive uropathy (COU) caused by a unilateral ureteral ligation. Here, we used DAPK-mutant mice, generated by the deletion of 74 amino acids from the catalytic kinase domain, to investigate the role of the DAPK kinase domain in regulating the p53 level following COU. The p53 expression levels in obstructed kidneys of wild-type and mutant mice were determined during the course of COU. Western blot analysis revealed that the p53 protein levels were significantly increased at 5 days after a ureteral ligation. This increase in the p53 level was significantly attenuated in mutant kidneys compared to wild-type kidneys. The obstructed kidneys of DAPK-mutant mice showed a significantly lower number of p53-expressing renal tubule cells than wild-type mice. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that DAPK stabilizes p53 protein in response to apoptosis-inducing stimuli. Thus, the present results suggest that the DAPK kinase domain is crucial for stabilizing p53 protein in renal tubular cell apoptosis in a mouse model of COU.
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PMID:Deletion of the kinase domain from death-associated protein kinase attenuates p53 expression in chronic obstructive uropathy. 1607 44

Aurora-C is the third member of the aurora serine/threonine kinase family and was found only in mammals. Because Aurora-C is overexpressed in many different types of cancer cells we decided to analyze the consequences of Aurora-C overexpression in human cells. We first investigated the subcellular localization of overexpressed GFP-Aurora-C in mitosis and interphase in HeLa cells. As expected, during mitosis, we found that Aurora-C mimics Aurora-B. Surprisingly, in few interphase cells, we found that Aurora-C localized to the centrosome, like Aurora-A. We then examined the phenotype generated by Aurora-C overexpression. Basically it looked similar to the phenotypes observed after overexpression of the other Aurora kinases. We observed an augmentation of polyploid cells containing more than two centrosomes. More interestingly this phenotype was aggravated in the absence of a functional p53. Although the physiological function of Aurora-C in somatic cells remains to be clarified, our results, just like for the two other Aurora kinases, raised the question of a role of Aurora-C in the development and progression of cancer especially in the presence of mutated p53.
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PMID:The absence of p53 aggravates polyploidy and centrosome number abnormality induced by Aurora-C overexpression. 1625 85

Increased expression and activity of the ubiquitous enzyme, tissue transglutaminase (TG2), is consistently seen in a variety of models of apoptosis. The p53 oncoprotein is also involved in apoptosis. Here we investigated the interaction of TG2 with p53 and show that the p53 is a substrate for the recently identified serine/threonine kinase activity of TG2. Phosphospecific antibodies indicated that TG2 phosphorylated p53 at Ser(15) and Ser(20), residues that are critically important in the interaction of p53 with Mdm2. The TG2-induced phosphorylation was abrogated by high Ca(2+) concentrations and inhibited by cystamine, a known inhibitor of TG2 cross-linking activity. Furthermore, we demonstrate that TG2-induced phosphorylation of p53 reduces the ability of p53 to interact with Mdm2. Although TG2 cross-linking activity has been clearly implicated in apoptosis, our observations reported here suggest TG2 modification of p53 could be an additional mechanism whereby TG2 could facilitate apoptosis.
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PMID:The p53 oncoprotein is a substrate for tissue transglutaminase kinase activity. 1631 86

The LKB1/STK11 serine/threonine kinase is mutated in Peutz-Jeghers syndrome and various sporadic cancers such as lung adenocarcinoma. We show here that LKB1 forms a complex with LMO4, GATA-6, and Ldb1, and enhances GATA-mediated transactivation in a kinase-dependent manner. We further demonstrate that LKB1 has the potential to induce p21 expression in collaboration with LMO4, GATA-6, and Ldb1 through the p53-independent mechanism. Our findings suggest that LKB1 regulates GATA-mediated gene expression and that this activity of LKB1 may be important for its tumor suppressor function.
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PMID:The tumor suppressor LKB1 induces p21 expression in collaboration with LMO4, GATA-6, and Ldb1. 1658 Jun 34

The serine/threonine kinase HIPK2 phosphorylates the p53 protein at Ser 46, thus promoting p53-dependent gene expression and subsequent apoptosis. Here, we show that DNA damaging chemotherapeutic drugs cause degradation of endogenous HIPK2 dependent on the presence of a functional p53 protein. Early induced p53 allows caspase-mediated cleavage of HIPK2 following aspartic acids 916 and 977. The resulting C-terminally truncated HIPK2 forms show an enhanced induction of the p53 response and cell death, thus allowing the rapid amplification of the p53-dependent apoptotic program during the initiation phase of apoptosis by a regulatory feed-forward loop. The active HIPK2 fragments are further degraded during the execution and termination phase of apoptosis, thus ensuring the occurrence of HIPK2 signaling only during the early phases of apoptosis induction.
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PMID:Autoregulatory control of the p53 response by caspase-mediated processing of HIPK2. 1660 78

Small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) have become the most powerful and widely used gene silencing reagents for reverse functional genomics and molecular therapeutics. The key challenge for achieving effective gene silencing in particular for the purpose of the therapeutics is primarily dependent on the effectiveness and specificity of the RNAi targeting sequence. However, only a limited number of siRNAs is capable of inducing highly effective and sequence-specific gene silencing by RNA interference (RNAi) mechanism. In addition, the efficacy of siRNA-induced gene silencing can only be experimentally measured based on inhibition of the target gene expression. Therefore, it is important to establish a fully robust and comparative validating system for determining the efficacy of designed siRNAs. In this study, we have developed a reliable and quantitative reporter-based siRNA validation system that consists of a short synthetic DNA fragment containing an RNAi targeting sequence of interest and two expression vectors for targeting reporter and triggering siRNA expression. The efficacy of the siRNAs is measured by their abilities to inhibit expression of the targeting reporter gene with easily quantified readouts including enhanced green fluorescence protein (EGFP) and firefly luciferase. Using fully analyzed siRNAs against human hepatitis B virus (HBV) surface antigen (HBsAg) and tumor suppressor protein p53, we have demonstrated that this system could effectively and faithfully report the efficacy of the corresponding siRNAs. In addition, we have further applied this system for screening and identification of the highly effective siRNAs that could specifically inhibit expression of mouse matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP-7), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) latent membrane protein 1 (LMP1), and human serine/threonine kinase AKT1. Since only a readily available short synthetic DNA fragment is needed for constructing this novel reporter-based siRNA validation system, this system not only provides a powerful strategy for screening highly effective siRNAs but also implicates in the use of RNAi for studying novel gene function in mammals.
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PMID:A novel siRNA validation system for functional screening and identification of effective RNAi probes in mammalian cells. 1679 20

The present study was carried out in order to examine the molecular status of selected growth factor receptors (GFR) in urinary bladder lesions, recently described by our group as representing 'Chernobyl cystitis'. Fibroblast growth factor receptor 3 (FGFR3), epidermal growth factor receptor 1 (EGFR1), EGFR2neu (a member of the same family), p53 and Raf-1 serine/threonine kinase expression were evaluated immunohistochemically in urinary bladder biopsies from 22 men with benign prostate hyperplasia (group 1). For comparison, 16 men with benign prostate hyperplasia and five women with chronic cystitis living in non-radio-contaminated areas of the country were also investigated as controls (group 2). Additionally, 14 patients with dysplasia, carcinoma in situ (CIS) and primary urothelial carcinoma (UC) operated before the Chernobyl accident as well as 23 patients with UC living in the radio-contaminated areas were included as pre- and post-Chernobyl UC groups 1 and 2, respectively. Chronic proliferative atypical cystitis ('Chernobyl cystitis') was observed in group 1 patients. Foci of dysplasia and CIS were found in 22 (100%) and 19 (86%) of the 22 cases, respectively; moreover, two small UC were also detected. Elevated levels of FGFR3, EGFR2/neu, p53 and to a lesser extent EGFR1 and Raf-1 expression in the urothelial dysplasia and CIS were evident for patients of group 1. Statistically significant differences in immunohistochemical scores for FGFR3, EGFR1, p53 and Raf-1 were observed between groups 1 and 2 and between group 1 and the post-Chernobyl UC group 2, where a change in expression of EGFR2/neu was also noted. A significant decrease in FGFR3 expression in additional pre-Chernobyl UC group 1 with dysplasia, CIS and UC compared with group 1 Chernobyl cystitis cases was detected. Our findings suggest that FGFR and EGFR signaling pathways, associated with p53 and Raf-1 activation, may contribute to multistage urothelial carcinogenesis caused by irradiation, through autocrine or paracrine growth stimulation.
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PMID:Upregulation of fibroblast growth factor receptor 3 and epidermal growth factor receptors, in association with Raf-1, in urothelial dysplasia and carcinoma in situ after the Chernobyl accident. 1696 95

The tumor suppressor LKB1 is an evolutionarily conserved serine/threonine kinase. In humans, LKB1 can be inactivated either by germ-line mutations resulting in Peutz-Jeghers syndrome or by somatic mutations causing predisposition to multiple sporadic cancers. LKB1 has wide-ranging functions involved in tumor suppression and cell homeostasis, including establishing cell polarity, setting energy metabolic balance (via phosphorylation of AMP-dependent kinase), regulating the cell cycle, and promoting apoptosis. LKB1 function was previously linked to the tumor suppressor p53 and shown to activate the p53 target gene p21/WAF1. In this study, we further investigated LKB1 activation of the p21/WAF1 gene and addressed whether LKB1 is directly involved at the gene promoter. We find that, consistent with previous studies, LKB1 stabilizes p53 in vivo, correlating with activation of p21/WAF1. We show that LKB1 physically associates with p53 in the nucleus and directly or indirectly phosphorylates p53 Ser15 (previously shown to be phosphorylated by AMP-dependent kinase) and p53 Ser392. Further, these two p53 residues are required for LKB1-dependent cell cycle G(1) arrest. Chromatin immunoprecipitation analyses show that LKB1 is recruited directly to the p21/WAF1 promoter, as well as to other p53 activated promoters, in a p53-dependent fashion. Finally, a genetic fusion of LKB1 to defective p53, deleted for its activation domains, promotes activation of p21/WAF1. These results indicate that LKB1 has a direct role in activation of p21/WAF1 gene.
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PMID:LKB1 is recruited to the p21/WAF1 promoter by p53 to mediate transcriptional activation. 1710 7

Homeodomain interacting protein kinase 2 (HIPK2) is an evolutionary conserved serine/threonine kinase that regulates gene expression by phosphorylation of transcription factors and accessory components of the transcription machinery. HIPK2 is activated in response to DNA-damaging agents or morphogenic signals and accordingly HIPK2-guided gene expression programs trigger differentiation and development or alternatively apoptosis. The kinase contributes to the regulation of remarkably diverse pathways such as p53 activation or Wnt signaling. Here we discuss recent findings from biochemical and functional experiments that allow a deeper understanding of the pleiotropic effects mediated by HIPK2.
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PMID:HIPK2: a versatile switchboard regulating the transcription machinery and cell death. 1724 28


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