Background
Human glioma is the most common and fatal type of intracranial tumour, and it has an aggressive malignant progression represented by devastation to normal brain tissue, resistance to therapeutic approaches, and widespread invasion throughout the brain [
1,
2]. The World Health Organization (WHO) classifies gliomas into four tumour grades (I–IV) according to their histopathology. Despite optimal treatment, patients with glioblastomas (GBM, WHO grade IV) still have a median survival of merely 12 to 15 months [
3,
4].
In recent years, molecular signatures have become conspicuous in the classification of gliomas with improvements in gene technology. Based on gene expression signatures, glioma can be segregated into three subtypes (proneural, PN; classical, CL; and mesenchymal, MES) [
5]. The mesenchymal subtype was identified as being particularly aggressive among these three subtypes [
6‐
8]. Therefore, there is an urgent need to explore novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets for glioma that have been molecularly distinguished as the mesenchymal subtype.
Cullin-7 (CUL7), also known as KIAA0076, is a DOC domain-containing cullin assembling an SCF-ROC1-like E3 ubiquitin ligase complex including Skp1, CUL7, Fbx29, and ROC1 [
9]. It has been reported that CUL7 is an oncogene directly involved in the regulation of cell transformation [
10]. Furthermore, the upregulation of CUL7 has been revealed in multifarious malignant tumours, such as hepatocellular carcinoma [
11], epithelial ovarian cancer [
12], lung cancer [
13], breast cancer [
14], and choriocarcinoma [
15]; thus, there is a good chance that CUL7 plays an important role in tumour progression. However, the expression level and clinical significance of CUL7 in human gliomas has not been confirmed. In addition, whether CUL7 is involved in the proliferation, apoptosis, invasion and migration of glioma remains unknown.
MST1 (mammalian sterile 20 like kinase 1) participates in the Hippo signalling pathway and was cloned by Chernoff’s group in 1995 [
16]. Recently, it has been reported that MST1 inhibits TNFα-induced NF-κB signalling by regulating LUBAC activity [
17]. MST1 plays a significant role in regulating gene expression, cell proliferation and apoptosis, and tumorigenesis [
18].
MicroRNAs (miRNAs), a class of noncoding, small RNAs composed of 18–23 nucleotides, negatively regulate the expression of various genes at the posttranscriptional level by interacting directly with the 3′-untranslated regions (3′-UTRs) of their messenger RNAs (mRNAs) [
19]. Many researchers have reported the involvement of miRNAs in the diversity of carcinogenesis. Dysregulation of miRNAs has been recognized to be associated with a variety of disorders, particularly cancers [
20]. However, there is still inadequate understanding of miRNA interactions with vital signalling pathways in gliomas.
In this study, we demonstrated that CUL7 acted as a novel oncogene associated with NF-κB activation in glioma, and we investigated its relationship with miR-3940-5p, a microRNA that has been reported to inhibit cell proliferation [
21]. Our results revealed that overexpression of miR-3940-5p could reduce the expression of CUL7 and inhibit proliferation, invasion and migration in gliomas.
Materials and methods
Clinical specimens and databases
The data for the mRNA expression microarrays and the attendant clinical information for the samples were downloaded from The Cancer Genome Atlas Research Network (
n = 603; TCGA,
http://cancergenome.nih.gov) and were used for the analysis. In addition, the Chinese Glioma Genome Atlas (
n = 301; CGGA,
http://www.cgga.org.cn), an external independent glioma database, was also mined. Archived paraffin embedded glioma tissues (WHO grades I–IV) were gathered from patients (
n = 38) who underwent surgery in the Department of Neurosurgery, Qilu Hospital of Shandong University. Normal brain tissue samples (
n = 4) were collected from severe traumatic brain injury patients who experienced partial resection of the normal brain as decompression treatment.
Immunohistochemistry (IHC)
Sections were obtained from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissues of different grades of human gliomas and normal brains. Sections were heated, deparaffinized, rehydrated and placed in sodium citrate buffer (pH 6.0) for antigen retrieval, and endogenous HRP activity was blocked with 3% hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). The slides were blocked with 10% normal goat serum and incubated with primary antibodies (mouse anti-CUL7 antibody, Santa Cruz, USA; rabbit anti-Ki67 antibody, Cell Signaling Technology, USA) at 4 °C overnight. The signal was visualized using standard protocols with horseradish-peroxidase-conjugated secondary antibodies and 3, 3′-diaminobenzidine (DAB) as the substrate. The sections were incubated with normal mouse serum as negative controls. Then, the slides were counterstained with haematoxylin, and typical images were obtained using a Leica DM 2500 microscope. The protein expression were scored by Image Pro Plusversion (IPP) image processing software.
Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA)
To gain insight into the biological processes and signalling pathways associated with CUL7 expression in gliomas, GSEA was performed using the Broad Institute GSEA version 4.0 software. The TCGA database was downloaded. The gene sets used for the enrichment analysis were downloaded from the Molecular Signatures Database (MsigDB,
http://software.broadinstitute.org/gsea/index.jsp).
Cell culture
U87MG, U251 and A172 human glioma cell lines and normal human astrocytes (NHA) were obtained from the Culture Collection of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Shanghai, China) and cultured in Dulbecco’s modified Eagle’s medium (DMEM; Thermo Fisher Scientific; USA) that was supplemented with 10% foetal bovine serum (FBS; Gibco; USA). GSC 267 were kindly provided by Dr. Krishna P.L. Bhat (The University of Texas, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX) and cultured in DMEM/F12 media supplemented with B27 (Invitrogen, USA), EGF (R&D Systems, USA), and bFGF (R&D Systems, USA). These cells were maintained at 37 °C in a humidified chamber containing 5% CO2.
CUL7 silencing and overexpression
Small interfering RNA (siRNA) targeting CUL7 were synthesized (GenePharma; Shanghai, China). siRNAs were transfected with Lipofectamine™ 3000 reagent (Thermo Fisher Scientific; USA) according to the manufacturer’s protocol. Stable knockdown of CUL7 in cells was generated using lentiviral transduction of shCUL7 (Genepharma; Shanghai, China). Knockdown efficiency was assessed 48 h after transfection by western blotting. Negative control (NC) sequences are as follows: 5′-UUCUCCGAACGUGUCACGUTT-3′; siRNA sequences that generated efficient knockdown are as follows: si-CUL7#1: 5′-UGAGAUCCUAGCUGAACUGTT-3′; and si-CUL7#2: 5′-AGAACUCCGCUACAGGGAAUU − 3′. Plasmid construction of GV141-CUL7 was performed by GeneChem (Shanghai, China). Cells were transfected with GV141-CUL7 to induce the overexpression of CUL7 and with empty GV141 vector (GV141) as a control.
Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR)
Total RNA was isolated from glioma cells using TRIzol reagent (Invitrogen, Life Technologies). Reverse transcription was performed using High Capacity cDNA Reverse Transcription Kits (Applied Bio-systems) according to the manufacturer’s protocols. The cDNA was subjected to real-time PCR using the quantitative PCR System Mx-3000P (Stratagene). The sequences of the PCR primers are as follows: hsa-miR-3940-5p F primer, 5′-TAAAAGTGGGTTGGGGCGG-3′, R primer, 5′-GTGCAGGGTCCGAGGT-3′; U6 F primer, 5′-CAGCACATATACTAAAATTGGAACG-3′, R primer, 5′-ACGAATTTGCGTGTCATCC-3′; CUL7 F primer, 5′ -ACCTGAAGGCGGTCTCTGT-3′, R primer, 5′-CCTTGCTGCCATCTCGAATC-3′; MST1 F primer, 5′-GGCCTTCCACTACAACGTGA-3′, R primer, 5′-GCAGGTCCGTACGTAGTCTTT-3′; GADPH F primer, 5′-GCACCGTCAAGGCTGAGAAC-3′, R primer: 5′-TGGTGAAGACGCCAGTGGA-3′. The relative miRNA/mRNA expression normalized to U6/GAPDH was analysed using GraphPad Prism 6 software.
Western blotting
Harvested cells were lysed with heat denaturation in RIPA cell lysis buffer. Protein lysates (20 μg) were loaded and separated on SDS-PAGE, and the proteins were transferred to polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) membranes. The blots were incubated with primary antibodies against CUL7, cleaved-PARP, Ub (Santa Cruz, USA); p21, p27, Cyclin D1, CDK4, Cyclin E1, CDK2, MST1, Phospho-IKK, IKKα, Phospho-IκBα, IκBα, Phospho-NF-κB p65, NF-κB p65, Bcl-2, Bax, cleaved-caspase3, N-cadherin, Vimentin, Slug, Twist, MMP2, GAPDH (Cell Signaling Technology, USA); and E-cadherin, MMP9 (Proteintech, China). Specific proteins were visualized with enhanced chemiluminescence (ECL, Millipore, Bredford, USA). The intensity of the protein bands was measured (ImageJ software) and normalized to GAPDH.
Co-immunoprecipitation
Cells were lysed in IP buffer (Pierce, Rockford, USA) including protease inhibitor cocktail (Sigma). The lysates were incubated with 5 μg appropriate primary antibodies or IgG and Protein A/G agarose beads (Pierce) overnight at 4 °C with gentle shaking. The immunoprecipitated complexes were then washed with lysis buffer three or four times and eluted from the beads with protein loading buffer. Western blotting analysis was then performed for detection of proteins.
Cycloheximide (CHX) chase
Cells were infected with siRNA targeting CUL7. After 48 h, CHX (25 μg/mL) was added to the culture medium to inhibit translation, and cells were incubated for 0, 2, 4, or 6 h. Cell lysates were prepared, and protein was examined using western blot analysis. Experiments were performed in triplicate.
Cell counting kit (CCK)-8 assay
The Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) was used to evaluate the cell viability according to the manufacturer’s instructions (Dojindo, Japan). U87MG or U251 cells (5 × 10 3 cells/well) were incubated in 96-well plates for 24, 48, and 72 h. The CCK-8 solution (10 μL) was added to each well and the plates were incubated for 1 h at 37 °C, and then the absorbance at 450 nm wavelength (OD450) was measured in a Microplate Reader (Bio-Rad).
5-ethynyl-2′-deoxyuridine (EdU) cell proliferation assay
Cell proliferation rates were measured by an EdU cell proliferation assay kit (RiboBio, #C10310–1; China). Cells were incubated with 200 μL of 5-ethynyl-20-deoxyuridine (EdU) for 2 h at 37 °C. Cells were fixed in 4% paraformaldehyde for 20 min, permeabilized with 0.4% Triton X-100 for 10 min, and incubated with Apollo® reagent (100 μL) for 30 min. The cells were stained with Hoechst for 30 mins, and representative images were obtained using a Nikon inverted fluorescence microscope. The cell proliferation rate was assessed using the ratio of EdU positive cells (Red) to the total Hoechst positive cells (Blue).
Flow cytometry
Cell cycle analysis was performed by determining the DNA content with propidium iodide (PI) staining (BD Biosciences; San Jose, CA, USA). Briefly, U87MG and U251 glioma cells were harvested, re-suspended and stained with propidium iodide (PI; BD Biosciences) in the presence of RNase A for 20 min. Apoptosis was evaluated in the U87MG and U251 cells with Annexin V-FITC and PI staining (15 min; BD Biosciences). Cells were analysed using a flow cytometer (BD Biosciences) according to the manufacturer’s instructions.
For the colony formation assay, cells were seeded in 6-well plates at a density of 2000 cells/well. The DMEM containing 10% FBS was changed every third day. After 15 days, the colonies were fixed with 4% paraformaldehyde for 30 mins and stained with crystal violet for 15 mins, and representative colonies were imaged and quantified.
3D tumour spheroid invasion assay
Glioma spheroids were generated by incubating cells in the spheroid formation matrix for 72 h in a 3D culture qualified 96-well spheroid formation plate. Spheroids with a diameter of > 200 mm were embedded into the invasion matrix (Trevigen, Gaithersburg, USA) composed of basement membrane proteins in the 96-well plate. Glioma spheroids were photographed every 24 h under Nikon microscopy. The spheroids at 0 h were used as a reference point for measurement of the area invaded by sprouting cells.
Transwell invasion and migration assays
To further assess invasiveness, the filters were pre-coated with Matrigel. Glioma cells were added to the top chamber in serum-free media. The bottom chamber was filled with 10% FBS DMEM. After 24–48 h of incubation, the top chamber cells were removed using a cotton swab, and the membrane was fixed in 4% paraformaldehyde for 15 min and stained with crystal violet for 15 min. Five fields of adherent cells in each well were photographed randomly. To measure migration, the filters were not pre-coated with Matrigel.
GSCs were plated in 48-well plates at a density of 2000 cells per well with 250 μL of the GSC culture media mentioned above, and the transfections were performed. Three to four days later, an additional 70 μL of the aforementioned treatment was added. Tumorsphere numbers were calculated on the seventh day after cell placement.
Intracranial mouse model
To establish intracranial gliomas, U87MG luciferase cells (3 × 105) were transfected with Lenti-sh-CUL7 or Lenti-Control virus and then stereotactically implanted into the brains of 4-week-old nude mice (SLAC Laboratory Animal Center; Shanghai, China). Bioluminescence imaging was used to detect intracranial tumour growth on days 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25. Kaplan-Meier survival curves were plotted to determine the survival time and weight. Tumour tissues were harvested at 15 days after implantation, fixed in formalin, embedded in paraffin, sectioned and incubated with antibodies against CUL7 (Santa Cruz, USA), MST1(Abcam, UK), Ki-67 (Cell Signaling Technology, USA) and N-cadherin (Cell Signaling Technology, USA).
Luciferase reporter assays
HEK293 cells were cotransfected with firefly luciferase reporters and the indicated plasmids using Lipofectamine 3000 (Invitrogen/Thermo Fisher Scientific), and luciferase assays were performed 24 h later using the Dual Luciferase Reporter Assay Kit (Promega). Renilla activity was used to normalize the luciferase reporter activity. The reporter genes containing GV272-CUL7 and GV272-mutCUL7 were synthesized by Genechem (Shanghai, China).
Statistical analysis
Survival curves were estimated by the Kaplan-Meier method and compared using the log-rank test. The cut-off level was set at the median value of the CUL7 expression levels. The expression pattern of CUL7 in different glioma subtypes and the associations of CUL7 with isocitrate dehydrogenase 1 (IDH1) mutations, methylation of the O-methylguanine-DNA methyltransferase (MGMT) promoter, codeletion of 1p/19q, telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) loss, and alpha thalassemia/ mental retardation syndrome X-linked (ATRX) mutation were performed using the TCGA dataset. A two-tailed χ2 test was used to determine the association between CUL7 expression and clinicopathological characteristics. Pearson correlation was used to evaluate the linear relationship between the expression of different genes. A one-way ANOVA test or Student’s t test were used for all other data comparisons using the Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS) software. All data are presented as the mean ± standard error. All tests were two-sided, and P-values < 0.05 were considered to be statistically significant. The experimental graphs were generated using GraphPad Prism 6 software.
Discussion
At present, the prognosis of glioma patients is very poor, even when multimodal treatment strategies are used. Many important efforts have been made to identify prognostic molecular biomarkers that could provide explanations regarding glioma formation and progression. In this study, we showed that CUL7 was highly expressed in gliomas, especially in mesenchymal subtypes, and found that the expression of CUL7 increased as the overall survival of patients decreased, which demonstrated that CUL7 plays a significant role in the malignancy of glioma. In contrast, low CUL7 mRNA levels were linked to other positive prognostic markers, including IDH1 and ATRX mutations, MGMT methylation, 1p/19q codeletion, and loss of TERT expression. To test this finding, we verified that downregulation of CUL7 inhibited the proliferation, migration and invasion of glioma cell lines in vitro and in vivo.
Abnormal cell proliferation and growth are characteristics of human gliomas [
39]. Many genetic changes induce uncontrolled growth through dysregulation of many proteins that are directly or indirectly involved in cell cycle progression and apoptosis [
39]. GSEA analysis indicated that CUL7 might indeed promote proliferation and inhibit apoptosis, which was supported by in vitro and in vivo evidence. CUL7 silencing in glioma cells inhibited proliferation through cell cycle arrest at G0/G1 and induced cell apoptosis and reduced growth in orthotopic xenografts. The results show that knockdown of CUL7 leads to reduced cell proliferation in vitro, and in vivo data suggest that it is a potential molecular target for therapy. Moreover, CUL7 overexpression promoted proliferation in glioma cells in our study. Although many previous studies have reported that CUL7 promoted tumorigenesis by suppressing P53 [
10,
40,
41], CUL7 also promoted the proliferation of U251, a glioma cell line with mutated p53 [
42], in our study; this indicates that CUL7 could have other independent pathways to promote the development of glioma. In this way, to attain the potential molecular mechanisms by which CUL7 promotes glioma development, we detected the expression changes of some key mediators of cell proliferation and apoptosis, including p21, p27, cyclin D1, CDK4, cyclin E1 and CDK2. In our study, CUL7 knockdown led to significantly increased levels of tumour suppressors p21 and p27, resulting in the reduction of downstream oncogenic factors, including cyclin D1, CDK4, cyclin E1 and CDK2. In contrast, CUL7 overexpression decreased the levels of tumour suppressors and upregulated downstream oncogenic factors. These data suggest that CUL7 promotes cell proliferation in gliomas.
EMT is a key event driving the invasion of glioma cells [
43,
44]. In addition, several EMT-related factors are associated with increased invasion and poor prognosis in gliomas [
45‐
47]. Here, we observed that CUL7 depletion significantly reversed EMT features and decreased invasiveness in glioma cells. Using western blotting, we observed that several mesenchymal markers, such as N-cadherin, Vimentin and Slug, were decreased and that an epithelial factor (E-cadherin) was increased after CUL7 depletion in gliomas. CUL7 silencing appeared to specifically suppress the progression of EMT in glioma cells, which reduced their invasion abilities. Moreover, in our study, CUL7 overexpression promoted the progression of EMT in glioma cells. Therefore, these results indicated that CUL7 may serve as a crucial regulator of invasion and migration by inducing mesenchymal-like properties in gliomas.
The NF-κB pathway regulates gliomagenesis [
48,
49]. In cells, IκB interacts with NF-κB(p65), leading to NF-κB(p65)/IκB complex sequestration in the cytoplasm, preventing NF-κB(p65) from binding to target DNA sequences. Some signalling cascades activate IKK, and IKK phosphorylates IκB in the cytoplasm, resulting in IκB degradation by the proteasome and NF-κB (p65) release from the inhibitory complex. Then, NF-κB proteins translocate into the nucleus, where they bind to DNA and activate gene transcription [
50]. Lee et al. established that MST1 negatively regulates the NF-κB pathway by inhibiting the E3 ligase activity of HOIP and acts as a component of TNF-RSC that inhibits the linear ubiquitin chain-forming activity of LUBAC in a TRAF2-dependent manner [
17]. We found that CUL7 activated the NF-κB pathway by promoting ubiquitin-mediated MST1 protein degradation using coimmunoprecipitation (co-IP) and western blot analysis.
Consistent with our current study, CUL7 has been reported to be upregulated and to induce oncogenic functions in multiple cancers. For example, CUL7 promotes the survival of a variety of cancer cells, including MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells, HeLa cells and HEK293T cells, by promoting caspase-8 ubiquitination [
51]. In addition, CUL7 overexpression and unfavourable prognosis have been reported to be correlated in hepatocellular carcinoma [
11], epithelial ovarian cancer [
12], lung cancer [
13], breast cancer [
14], and choriocarcinoma [
15]. Thus, CUL7 may be a broad-spectrum biomarker and therapeutic target.
Although we analysed only two cell lines (U87MG and U251) and one glioma stem cell line (GSC267) in these studies, our orthotopic xenograft results provide powerful evidence; therefore, we speculate that other glioma cell lines will show similar results.
The role of CUL7 and its related pathways have been well demonstrated, but the upstream regulators of CUL7 remain largely unknown. miRNAs play a critical role in the posttranscriptional or translational regulation of gene expression [
52]. To date, no studies have focused on the miRNAs regulating CUL7. In this regard, we conducted searches to identify miRNAs that might regulate CUL7 based on bioinformatic analysis and found that miR-3940-5p negatively regulated the expression of CUL7 in glioma cells. Recently, it has been reported that miR-3940-5p expression of miR-3940-5p is reduced in non-small-cell lung carcinoma and functions as a tumour suppressor [
53,
54]. However, while one miRNA can target many genes, each gene can be regulated by multiple miRNAs [
55]. In this way, further works are needed to discover the mechanisms involved in regulating CUL7.
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