Increased AR expression in castration-resistant prostate cancer rapidly induces AR signaling reprogramming with the collaboration of EZH2

Abstract

Elevated androgen receptor (AR) expression is a hallmark of castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) and contributes to the restoration of AR signaling under the conditions of androgen deprivation. However, whether overexpressed AR alone with the stimulation of castrate levels of androgens can be sufficient to induce the reprogramming of AR signaling for the adaptation of prostate cancer (PCa) cells remains unclear. In this study, we used a PCa model with inducible overexpression of AR to examine the acute effects of AR overexpression on its cistrome and transcriptome. Our results show that overexpression of AR alone in conjunction with lower androgen levels can rapidly redistribute AR chromatin binding and activates a distinct transcription program that is enriched for DNA damage repair pathways. Moreover, using a recently developed bioinformatic tool, we predicted the involvement of EZH2 in this AR reprogramming and subsequently identified a subset of AR/EZH2 co-targeting genes, which are overexpressed in CRPC and associated with worse patient outcomes. Mechanistically, we found that AR-EZH2 interaction is impaired by the pre-castration level of androgens but can be recovered by the post-castration level of androgens. Overall, our study provides new molecular insights into AR signaling reprogramming with the engagement of specific epigenetic factors.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Nov 03, 2022
Source ID
10.3389/fonc.2022.1021845

Entities

People

  • Breelyn Karno
  • Changmeng Cai
  • Dong Han
  • Jill Macoska
  • Kourosh Zarringhalam
  • Lily Ting
  • Maryam Labaf
  • Muqing Li
  • Shuai Gao
  • Songqi Zhang
  • Susan Patalano

Organizations

  • National Institutes of Health
  • United States Department of Defense

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Biology

Readers

  • Prostate Cancer Biology.