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Wegiel, Barbara

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Wegiel

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Barbara

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Wegiel, Barbara
Author's Publications: search.filters.isAuthorOfPublication.86b59a5b-89fa-4b72-be82-3080d000ff84

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    Heme oxygenase-1 in macrophages controls prostate cancer progression
    (Impact Journals LLC, 2015) Nemeth, Zsuzsanna; Li, Mailin; Csizmadia, Eva; Döme, Balazs; Johansson, Martin; Persson, Jenny Liao; Seth, Pankaj; Otterbein, Leo; Wegiel, Barbara
    Innate immune cells strongly influence cancer growth and progression via multiple mechanisms including regulation of epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT). In this study, we investigated whether expression of the metabolic gene, heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) in tumor microenvironment imparts significant effects on prostate cancer progression. We showed that HO-1 is expressed in MARCO-positive macrophages in prostate cancer (PCa) xenografts and human prostate cancers. We demonstrated that macrophage specific (LyzM-Cre) conditional deletion of HO-1 suppressed growth of PC3 xenografts in vivo and delayed progression of prostate intraepithelial neoplasia (PIN) in TRAMP mice. However, initiation and progression of cancer xenografts in the presence of macrophages lacking HO-1 resulted in loss of E-cadherin, a known marker of poor prognosis as well as EMT. Application of CO, a product of HO-1 catalysis, increased levels of E-cadherin in the adherens junctions between cancer cells. We further showed that HO-1-driven expression of E-cadherin in cancer cells cultured in the presence of macrophages is dependent on mitochondrial activity of cancer cells. In summary, these data suggest that HO-1-derived CO from tumor-associated macrophages influences, in part, E-cadherin expression and thus tumor initiation and progression.
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    Alterations of tumor microenvironment by carbon monoxide impedes lung cancer growth
    (Impact Journals LLC, 2016) Nemeth, Zsuzsanna; Csizmadia, Eva; Vikstrom, Lisa; Li, Mailin; Bisht, Kavita; Feizi, Alborz; Otterbein, Sherrie; Zuckerbraun, Brian; Costa, Daniel; Pandolfi, Pier Paolo; Fillinger, Janos; Döme, Balazs; Otterbein, Leo; Wegiel, Barbara
    We hypothesized that tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs) are controlled by the diffusible gas carbon monoxide (CO). We demonstrate that induction of apoptosis in lung tumors treated with low doses of CO is associated with increased CD86 expression and activation of mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK)/extracellular signal-regulated kinases (Erk) 1/2 pathway in tumor microenvironment. Presence of CD86-positive cells was required for the anti-tumoral effects of CO in established A549 xenografts. We show that the effects of CO on tumor stroma and reprogramming of macrophages towards the anti-tumoral phenotype is mediated by reactive oxygen species (ROS)-dependent activation of MAPK/Erk1/2-c-myc pathway as well as Notch 1-dependent negative feedback on the metabolic enzyme heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1). We find a similar negative correlation between HO-1 and active MAPK-Erk1/2 levels in human lung cancer specimens. In summary, we describe novel non-cell autonomous mechanisms by which the diffusible gas CO dictates changes in the tumor microenvironment through the modulation of macrophages.
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    Cystatin C is Downregulated in Prostate Cancer and Modulates Invasion of Prostate Cancer Cells via MAPK/Erk and Androgen Receptor Pathways
    (Public Library of Science, 2009) Wegiel, Barbara; Jiborn, Thomas; Abrahamson, Magnus; Helczynski, Leszek; Otterbein, Leo; Persson, Jenny Liao; Bjartell, Anders
    Cystatin C is believed to prevent tumor progression by inhibiting the activities of a family of lysosomal cysteine proteases. However, little is known about the precise mechanism of cystatin C function in prostate cancer. In the present study, we examined the expression of cystatin C and its association with matrix metalloproteinases 2 (MMP2) and androgen receptor (AR) in a tissue microarray comparing benign and malignant specimens from 448 patients who underwent radical prostatectomy for localized prostate cancer. Cystatin C expression was significantly lower in cancer specimens than in benign tissues (p<0.001) and there was a statistically significant inverse correlation between expression of cystatin C and MMP2 (rs2 = −0.056, p = 0.05). There was a clear trend that patients with decreased level of cystatin C had lower overall survival. Targeted inhibition of cystatin C using specific siRNA resulted in an increased invasiveness of PC3 cells, whereas induction of cystatin C overexpression greatly reduced invasion rate of PC3 in vitro. The effect of cystatin C on modulating the PC3 cell invasion was provoked by Erk2 inhibitor that specifically inhibited MAPK/Erk2 activity. This suggests that cystatin C may mediate tumor cell invasion by modulating the activity of MAPK/Erk cascades. Consistent with our immunohistochemical findings that patients with low expression of cystatin C and high expression of androgen receptor (AR) tend to have worse overall survival than patients with high expression of cystatin C and high AR expression, induced overexpression of AR in PC3 cells expressing cystatin C siRNA greatly enhanced the invasiveness of PC3 cells. This suggests that there may be a crosstalk between cystatin C and AR-mediated pathways. Our study uncovers a novel role for cystatin C and its associated cellular pathways in prostate cancer invasion and metastasis.