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Indispensable role of STIL in the regulation of cancer cell motility through the lamellipodial accumulation of ARHGEF7–PAK1 complex

Oncogene volume 39, pages 1931–1943 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Cell motility is a tightly regulated phenomenon that supports the accurate formation of organ structure during development and homeostasis, including wound healing and inflammation. Meanwhile, cancer cells exhibit dysregulated motility, which causes spreading and invasion. The Dbl family RhoGEF ARHGEF7/β-PIX and its binding partner p21-activated kinase PAK1 are overexpressed in a variety of cancers and have been shown to be responsible for cancer cell migration. A key step in motility is the intracellular transport of ARHGEF7–PAK1 complex to the migrating front of cells, where lamellipodia protrusion and cytoskeletal remodeling efficiently occur. However, the molecular mechanisms of the intracellular transport of this complex are not fully understood. Here we revealed that SCL/TAL1-interrupting locus (STIL) is indispensable for the efficient migration of cancer cells. STIL forms a ternary complex with ARHGEF7 and PAK1 and accumulates with those proteins at the lamellipodia protrusion of motile cells. Knockdown of STIL impedes the accumulation of ARHGEF7–PAK1 complex within membrane ruffles and attenuates the phosphorylation of PAK1 substrates and cortical actin remodeling at the migrating front. Intriguingly, ARHGEF7 knockdown also diminishes STIL and PAK1 accumulation in membrane ruffles. Either STIL or ARHGEF7 knockdown impedes cell migration and Rac1 activity at the migrating front of cells. These results indicate that STIL is involved in the ARHGEF7-mediated positive-feedback activation of cytoskeletal remodeling through accumulating the ARHGEF7–PAK1 complex in lamellipodia. We conclude that its involvement is crucial for the polarized formation of Rac1-mediated leading edge, which supports the efficient migration of cancer cells.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Norika Yamada, Kazuko Tanimizu, and Minako Suzuki for their excellent technical assistance and Tatsuhito Miyake and Yuji Nakagomi for laser confocal microscope. We also thank Yukiko Kuru (Faculty of Foreign Languages, Aichi Medical University School of Medicine) for English editing. This study was supported in part by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 16K19091 (HI), 17K08706 (SI), 19K06671 (AI), 18K07031 (HM), 16H06280 “ABiS” (MM), 15H05949 “Resonance Bio” (MM), 24590456 and 19K07449 (KK); Pancreas Research Foundation of Japan (HI).

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  1. Department of Pathology, Aichi Medical University School of Medicine, Nagakute, Japan

    Hideaki Ito, Takumi Tsunoda, Miho Riku, Shingo Inaguma, Akihito Inoko, Hideki Murakami, Hiroshi Ikeda & Kenji Kasai

  2. Department of Pathology and Biology of Diseases, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan

    Michiyuki Matsuda

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Correspondence to Kenji Kasai.

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Ito, H., Tsunoda, T., Riku, M. et al. Indispensable role of STIL in the regulation of cancer cell motility through the lamellipodial accumulation of ARHGEF7–PAK1 complex. Oncogene 39, 1931–1943 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41388-019-1115-9

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