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.

RNA

piRNA-unbound PIWIL1 promotes metastasis

Nature Cell Biology volume 22, pages 359–360 (2020)Cite this article

Subjects

Piwi proteins are aberrantly induced in human tumours, but their function in cancer has been poorly understood. A study now shows that in the absence of piRNA loading, human PIWIL1 promotes pancreatic cancer metastasis by acting as a co-activator of the anaphase-promoting complex/cyclosome (APC/C) to degrade the cell-adhesion protein Pinin.

In a survey of the expression patterns of PIWIL1 across various cancer types in The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and in multiple types of cancer cell lines, Li et al.6 observed upregulation of PIWIL1 in human tumours. They went on to examine whether PIWIL1 protein is piRNA-bound in cancer cells. RNA labelling revealed that ~30-nucleotide small RNAs (piRNAs) were enriched in the testis but not in tumour samples. In addition, RNA immunoprecipitation (RIP) analysis of PIWIL1-expressing cancer cells detected little small RNA in PIWIL1 immunoprecipitates, suggesting that in tumour cells, PIWIL1 protein is present in the ‘apo state’ without piRNA loading.

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

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Fig. 1: Models for the functions and mechanisms of action of PIWIL1.

References

  1. Cox, D. N. et al. Genes Dev. 12, 3715–3727 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Carmell, M. A. et al. Dev. Cell 12, 503–514 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Batista, P. J. et al. Mol. Cell 31, 67–78 (2008).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Suzuki, R., Honda, S. & Kirino, Y. Front. Genet. 3, 204 (2012).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Litwin, M., Szczepańska-Buda, A., Piotrowska, A., Dzięgiel, P. & Witkiewicz, W. Oncol. Lett. 13, 3354–3362 (2017).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Li, F. et al. Nat. Cell Biol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41556-020-0486-z (2020).

  7. Zhao, S. et al. Dev. Cell 24, 13–25 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Experimental Radiation Oncology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA

    Fan Yao & Li Ma

  2. The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Houston, TX, USA

    Li Ma

Authors
  1. Fan Yao
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Li Ma
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Li Ma.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yao, F., Ma, L. piRNA-unbound PIWIL1 promotes metastasis. Nat Cell Biol 22, 359–360 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41556-020-0502-3

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41556-020-0502-3

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing: Cancer

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Cancer newsletter — what matters in cancer research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get what matters in cancer research, free to your inbox weekly. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Cancer