Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Article
  • Published:

Protein Kinase N1 control of androgen-responsive serum response factor action provides rationale for novel prostate cancer treatment strategy

Abstract

Sustained reliance on androgen receptor (AR) after failure of AR-targeting androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) prevents effective treatment of castration-recurrent (CR) prostate cancer (CaP). Interfering with the molecular machinery by which AR drives CaP progression may be an alternative therapeutic strategy but its feasibility remains to be tested. Here, we explore targeting the mechanism by which AR, via RhoA, conveys androgen-responsiveness to serum response factor (SRF), which controls aggressive CaP behavior and is maintained in CR-CaP. Following a siRNA screen and candidate gene approach, RNA-Seq studies confirmed that the RhoA effector Protein Kinase N1 (PKN1) transduces androgen-responsiveness to SRF. Androgen treatment induced SRF-PKN1 interaction, and PKN1 knockdown or overexpression severely impaired or stimulated, respectively, androgen regulation of SRF target genes. PKN1 overexpression occurred during clinical CR-CaP progression, and hastened CaP growth and shortened CR-CaP survival in orthotopic CaP xenografts. PKN1’s effects on SRF relied on its kinase domain. The multikinase inhibitor lestaurtinib inhibited PKN1 action and preferentially affected androgen regulation of SRF over direct AR target genes. In a CR-CaP patient-derived xenograft, expression of SRF target genes was maintained while AR target gene expression declined and proliferative gene expression increased. PKN1 inhibition decreased viability of CaP cells before and after ADT. In patient-derived CaP explants, lestaurtinib increased AR target gene expression but did not significantly alter SRF target gene or proliferative gene expression. These results provide proof-of-principle for selective forms of ADT that preferentially target different fractions of AR’s transcriptional output to inhibit CaP growth.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Siegel RL, Miller KD, Jemal A. Cancer statistics, 2018. CA Cancer J Clin. 2018;68:7–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Karantanos T, Evans CP, Tombal B, Thompson TC, Montironi R, Isaacs WB. Understanding the mechanisms of androgen deprivation resistance in prostate cancer at the molecular level. Eur Urol. 2015;67:470–9.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Dai C, Heemers HV, Sharifi N. Androgen signalling in prostate cancer. Cold Spring Harb Perspect Med. 2017;7.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Luo J, Attard G, Balk SP, Bevan C, Burnstein K, Cato L, et al. Role of androgen receptor variants in prostate cancer: report from the 2017 mission androgen receptor variants meeting. Eur Urol. 2018;73:715–23.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Viswanathan SR, Ha G, Hoff AM, Wala JA, Carrot-Zhang J, Whelan CW, et al. Structural alterations driving castration-resistant prostate cancer revealed by linked-read genome sequencing. Cell. 2018;174:433–47 e19.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Mills IG. Maintaining and reprogramming genomic androgen receptor activity in prostate cancer. Nat Rev Cancer. 2014;14:187–98.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Kumari S, Senapati D, Heemers H. Rationale for the development of alternative forms of androgen deprivation therapy. Endocr Relat Cancer. 2017;24:R275–295.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Heemers HV, Regan KM, Dehm SM, Tindall DJ. Androgen induction of the androgen receptor coactivator four and a half LIM domain protein-2: evidence for a role for serum response factor in prostate cancer. Cancer Res. 2007;67:10592–9.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Heemers HV, Schmidt LJ, Sun Z, Regan KM, Anderson SK, Duncan K, et al. Identification of a clinically relevant androgen-dependent gene signature in prostate cancer. Cancer Res. 2011;71:1978–88.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Heemers HV, Tindall DJ. Androgen receptor (AR) coregulators: a diversity of functions converging on and regulating the AR transcriptional complex. Endocr Rev. 2007;28:778–808.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Heinlein CA, Chang C. Androgen receptor in prostate cancer. Endocr Rev. 2004;25:276–308.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Sun Q, Chen G, Streb JW, Long X, Yang Y, Stoeckert CJ, et al. Defining the mammalian CArGome. Genome Res. 2006;16:197–207.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Schmidt LJ, Duncan K, Yadav N, Regan KM, Verone AR, Lohse CM, et al. RhoA as a mediator of clinically relevant androgen action in prostate cancer cells. Mol Endocrinol. 2012;26:716–35.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Heemers HV. Identification of a RhoA- and SRF-dependent mechanism of androgen action that is associated with prostate cancer progression. Curr Drug Targets. 2013;14:481–9.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Shabbir M, Stuart R Lestaurtinib. a multitargeted tyrosine kinase inhibitor: from bench to bedside. Expert Opin Investig Drugs. 2010;19:427–36.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  16. Treisman R, Alberts AS, Sahai E. Regulation of SRF activity by Rho family GTPases. Cold Spring Harb Symp Quant Biol. 1998;63:643–51.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. He A, Kong SW, Ma Q, Pu WT. Co-occupancy by multiple cardiac transcription factors identifies transcriptional enhancers active in heart. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2011;108:5632–7.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  18. Schlesinger J, Schueler M, Grunert M, Fischer JJ, Zhang Q, Krueger T, et al. The cardiac transcription network modulated by Gata4, Mef2a, Nkx2.5, Srf, histone modifications, and microRNAs. PLoS Genet. 2011;7:e1001313.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Esnault C, Stewart A, Gualdrini F, East P, Horswell S, Matthews N, et al. Rho-actin signaling to the MRTF coactivators dominates the immediate transcriptional response to serum in fibroblasts. Genes Dev. 2014;28:943–58.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Gualdrini F, Esnault C, Horswell S, Stewart A, Matthews N, Treisman R. SRF co-factors control the balance between cell proliferation and contractility. Mol Cell. 2016;64:1048–61.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  21. Metzger E, Muller JM, Ferrari S, Buettner R, Schule R. A novel inducible transactivation domain in the androgen receptor: implications for PRK in prostate cancer. EMBO J. 2003;22:270–80.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Cleutjens KB, van Eekelen CC, van der Korput HA, Brinkmann AO, Trapman J. Two androgen response regions cooperate in steroid hormone regulated activity of the prostate-specific antigen promoter. J Biol Chem. 1996;271:6379–88.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Mitchell SH, Murtha PE, Zhang S, Zhu W, Young CY. An androgen response element mediates LNCaP cell dependent androgen induction of the hK2 gene. Mol Cell Endocrinol. 2000;168:89–99.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Wang Q, Li W, Liu XS, Carroll JS, Janne OA, Keeton EK, et al. A hierarchical network of transcription factors governs androgen receptor-dependent prostate cancer growth. Mol Cell. 2007;27:380–92.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Magee JA, Chang LW, Stormo GD, Milbrandt J. Direct, androgen receptor-mediated regulation of the FKBP5 gene via a distal enhancer element. Endocrinology. 2006;147:590–8.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  26. Taniguchi T, Kawamata T, Mukai H, Hasegawa H, Isagawa T, Yasuda M, et al. Phosphorylation of tau is regulated by PKN. J Biol Chem. 2001;276:10025–31.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  27. Takanaga H, Mukai H, Shibata H, Toshimori M, Ono Y. PKN interacts with a paraneoplastic cerebellar degeneration-associated antigen, which is a potential transcription factor. Exp Cell Res. 1998;241:363–72.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. Shibata H, Oda H, Mukai H, Oishi K, Misaki K, Ohkubo H, et al. Interaction of PKN with a neuron-specific basic helix-loop-helix transcription factor, NDRF/NeuroD2. Brain Res Mol Brain Res. 1999;74:126–34.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  29. Marshall JL, Kindler H, Deeken J, Bhargava P, Vogelzang NJ, Rizvi N, et al. Phase I trial of orally administered CEP-701, a novel neurotrophin receptor-linked tyrosine kinase inhibitor. Invest New Drugs. 2005;23:31–7.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  30. Knapper S, Burnett AK, Littlewood T, Kell WJ, Agrawal S, Chopra R, et al. A phase 2 trial of the FLT3 inhibitor lestaurtinib (CEP701) as first-line treatment for older patients with acute myeloid leukemia not considered fit for intensive chemotherapy. Blood. 2006;108:3262–70.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  31. Jilg CA, Ketscher A, Metzger E, Hummel B, Willmann D, Russeler V, et al. PRK1/PKN1 controls migration and metastasis of androgen-independent prostate cancer cells. Oncotarget. 2014;5:12646–64.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  32. Kohler J, Erlenkamp G, Eberlin A, Rumpf T, Slynko I, Metzger E, et al. Lestaurtinib inhibits histone phosphorylation and androgen-dependent gene expression in prostate cancer cells. PLoS ONE. 2012;7:e34973.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Hexner EO, Serdikoff C, Jan M, Swider CR, Robinson C, Yang S, et al. Lestaurtinib (CEP701) is a JAK2 inhibitor that suppresses JAK2/STAT5 signaling and the proliferation of primary erythroid cells from patients with myeloproliferative disorders. Blood. 2008;111:5663–71.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  34. Iyer R, Evans AE, Qi X, Ho R, Minturn JE, Zhao H, et al. Lestaurtinib enhances the antitumor efficacy of chemotherapy in murine xenograft models of neuroblastoma. Clin Cancer Res. 2010;16:1478–85.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  35. Liberzon A, Subramanian A, Pinchback R, Thorvaldsdottir H, Tamayo P, Mesirov JP. Molecular signatures database (MSigDB) 3.0. Bioinformatics. 2011;27:1739–40.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  36. Kim JY, Banerjee T, Vinckevicius A, Luo Q, Parker JB, Baker MR, et al. A role for WDR5 in integrating threonine 11 phosphorylation to lysine 4 methylation on histone H3 during androgen signaling and in prostate cancer. Mol Cell. 2014;54:613–25.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  37. Metzger E, Yin N, Wissmann M, Kunowska N, Fischer K, Friedrichs N, et al. Phosphorylation of histone H3 at threonine 11 establishes a novel chromatin mark for transcriptional regulation. Nat Cell Biol. 2008;10:53–60.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  38. Collins C, Carducci MA, Eisenberger MA, Isaacs JT, Partin AW, Pili R, et al. Preclinical and clinical studies with the multi-kinase inhibitor CEP-701 as treatment for prostate cancer demonstrate the inadequacy of PSA response as a primary endpoint. Cancer Biol Ther. 2007;6:1360–7.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  39. Liu S, Kumari S, Hu Q, Senapati D, Venkadakrishnan VB, Wang D, et al. A comprehensive analysis of coregulator recruitment, androgen receptor function and gene expression in prostate cancer. Elife. 2017;6:e28482.

  40. Godebu E, Muldong M, Strasner A, Wu CN, Park SC, Woo JR, et al. PCSD1, a new patient-derived model of bone metastatic prostate cancer, is castrate-resistant in the bone-niche. J Transl Med. 2014;12:275.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  41. Labbe DP, Sweeney CJ, Brown M, Galbo P, Rosario S, Wadosky KM, et al. TOP2A and EZH2 provide early detection of an aggressive prostate cancer subgroup. Clin Cancer Res. 2017;23:7072–83.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  42. Yamoah K, Johnson MH, Choeurng V, Faisal FA, Yousefi K, Haddad Z, et al. Novel biomarker signature that may predict aggressive disease in African American men with prostate cancer. J Clin Oncol. 2015;33:2789–96.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  43. Li Z, Alyamani M, Li J, Rogacki K, Abazeed M, Upadhyay SK, et al. Redirecting abiraterone metabolism to fine-tune prostate cancer anti-androgen therapy. Nature. 2016;533:547–51.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  44. Li J, Alyamani M, Zhang A, Chang KH, Berk M, Li Z, et al. Aberrant corticosteroid metabolism in tumor cells enables GR takeover in enzalutamide resistant prostate cancer. eLife 2017;6:e20183.

  45. Nyquist MD, Li Y, Hwang TH, Manlove LS, Vessella RL, Silverstein KA, et al. TALEN-engineered AR gene rearrangements reveal endocrine uncoupling of androgen receptor in prostate cancer. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2013;110:17492–7.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  46. Centenera MM, Raj GV, Knudsen KE, Tilley WD, Butler LM. Ex vivo culture of human prostate tissue and drug development. Nat Rev Urol. 2013;10:483–7.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  47. Nakagawa T, Kollmeyer TM, Morlan BW, Anderson SK, Bergstralh EJ, Davis BJ, et al. A tissue biomarker panel predicting systemic progression after PSA recurrence post-definitive prostate cancer therapy. PLoS ONE. 2008; 3: e2318.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  48. Itkonen HM, Brown M, Urbanucci A, Tredwell G, Ho Lau C, Barfeld S, et al. Lipid degradation promotes prostate cancer cell survival. Oncotarget. 2017;8:38264–75.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  49. Attard G, Borre M, Gurney H, Loriot Y, Andresen-Daniil C, Kalleda R, et al. Abiraterone alone or in combination with Enzalutamide in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer with rising prostate-specific antigen during Enzalutamide treatment. J Clin Oncol. 2018;36:2639–46, JCO2018779827.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  50. O’Hurley G, Prencipe M, Lundon D, O’Neill A, Boyce S, O’Grady A, et al. The analysis of serum response factor expression in bone and soft tissue prostate cancer metastases. Prostate. 2013;74:306–313.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  51. Prencipe M, Madden SF, O’Neill A, O’Hurley G, Culhane A, O’Connor D, et al. Identification of transcription factors associated with castration-resistance: Is the serum responsive factor a potential therapeutic target? Prostate. 2013;73:743–53.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  52. Prencipe M, O’Neill A, O’Hurley G, Nguyen LK, Fabre A, Bjartell A, et al. Relationship between serum response factor and androgen receptor in prostate cancer. Prostate. 2015;75:1704–17.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  53. Yu W, Feng S, Dakhova O, Creighton CJ, Cai Y, Wang J, et al. FGFR-4 Arg(3)(8)(8) enhances prostate cancer progression via extracellular signal-related kinase and serum response factor signaling. Clin Cancer Res. 2011;17:4355–66.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  54. O’Sullivan AG, Mulvaney EP, Kinsella BT. Regulation of protein kinase C-related kinase (PRK) signalling by the TPalpha and TPbeta isoforms of the human thromboxane A2 receptor: implications for thromboxane- and androgen- dependent neoplastic and epigenetic responses in prostate cancer. Biochim Biophys Acta. 2017;1863:838–56.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  55. George DJ, Dionne CA, Jani J, Angeles T, Murakata C, Lamb J, et al. Sustained in vivo regression of Dunning H rat prostate cancers treated with combinations of androgen ablation and Trk tyrosine kinase inhibitors, CEP-751 (KT-6587) or CEP-701 (KT-5555). Cancer Res. 1999;59:2395–401.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  56. Weeraratna AT, Dalrymple SL, Lamb JC, Denmeade SR, Miknyoczki S, Dionne CA, et al. Pan-trk inhibition decreases metastasis and enhances host survival in experimental models as a result of its selective induction of apoptosis of prostate cancer cells. Clin Cancer Res. 2001;7:2237–45.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  57. Scher HI, Morris MJ, Stadler WM, Higano C, Basch E, Fizazi K, et al. Trial design and objectives for castration-resistant prostate cancer: updated recommendations from the prostate cancer clinical trials working group 3. J Clin Oncol. 2016;34:1402–18.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  58. Olmos D, Brewer D, Clark J, Danila DC, Parker C, Attard G, et al. Prognostic value of blood mRNA expression signatures in castration-resistant prostate cancer: a prospective, two-stage study. Lancet Oncol. 2012;13:1114–24.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  59. Miyamoto DT, Lee RJ, Kalinich M, LiCausi JA, Zheng Y, Chen T, et al. An RNA-based digital circulating tumor cell signature is predictive of drug response and early dissemination in prostate cancer. Cancer Discov. 2018;8:288–303.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  60. Miyamoto DT, Zheng Y, Wittner BS, Lee RJ, Zhu H, Broderick KT, et al. RNA-Seq of single prostate CTCs implicates noncanonical Wnt signaling in antiandrogen resistance. Science. 2015;349:1351–6.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  61. Klaeger S, Heinzlmeir S, Wilhelm M, Polzer H, Vick B, Koenig PA, et al. The target landscape of clinical kinase drugs. Science. 2017;358:eaan4368.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  62. Ravindranathan P, Lee TK, Yang L, Centenera MM, Butler L, Tilley WD, et al. Peptidomimetic targeting of critical androgen receptor-coregulator interactions in prostate cancer. Nat Commun. 2013;4:1923.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  63. Kajimoto K, Shao D, Takagi H, Maceri G, Zablocki D, Mukai H, et al. Hypotonic swelling-induced activation of PKN1 mediates cell survival in cardiac myocytes. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol. 2011;300:H191–200.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr. Cassandra Talerico for review of the manuscript and Heemers lab members for helpful discussions. RNA-Seq was supported by NCI grant P30CA016056 involving the use of Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Genomic Shared Resource.

Financial support

These studies were supported by DOD PCRP award W81XWH-16–1–0404 (HVH), NIH NCI grants CA166440 (HVH), CA174777 (SMD), CA077739 (JLM), CA232979 (SL) and CA016056 (JLM and SL).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hannelore V. Heemers.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher’s note: Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Venkadakrishnan, V.B., DePriest, A.D., Kumari, S. et al. Protein Kinase N1 control of androgen-responsive serum response factor action provides rationale for novel prostate cancer treatment strategy. Oncogene 38, 4496–4511 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41388-019-0732-7

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41388-019-0732-7

Search

Quick links