Despite detailed knowledge of the components of the spindle assembly checkpoint, a molecular explanation of how cells die after prolonged spindle checkpoint activation, and thus how microtubule inhibitors and other antimitotic drugs ultimately elicit their lethal effects, has yet to emerge. Mitotically arrested cells typically display extensive phosphorylation of two key antiapoptotic proteins, Bcl-x L and Bcl-2, and evidence suggests that phosphorylation disables their antiapoptotic activity. However, the responsible kinase has remained elusive. In this report, evidence is presented that cyclin-dependent kinase 1 (CDK1)/cyclin B catalyzes mitoticarrest-induced Bcl-x L /Bcl-2 phosphorylation. Furthermore, we show that CDK1 transiently and incompletely phosphorylates these proteins during normal mitosis. When mitosis is prolonged in the absence of microtubule inhibition, Bcl-x L and Bcl-2 become highly phosphorylated. Transient overexpression of nondegradable cyclin B1 caused apoptotic death, which was blocked by a phosphodefective Bcl-x L mutant but not by a phosphomimetic Bcl-x L mutant, confirming Bcl-x L as a key target of proapoptotic CDK1 signaling. These findings suggest a model whereby a switch in the duration of CDK1 activation, from transient during mitosis to sustained during mitotic arrest, dramatically increases the extent of Bcl-x L /Bcl-2 phosphorylation, resulting in inactivation of their antiapoptotic function. Thus, phosphorylation of antiapoptotic Bcl-2 proteins acts as a sensor for CDK1 signal duration and as a functional link coupling mitotic arrest to apoptosis.

Vinblastine and other microtubule inhibitors used as antimitotic cancer drugs characteristically promote the phosphorylation of the key anti-apoptotic protein, Bcl-xL. However, putative sites of phosphorylation have been inferred based on potential recognition by JNK, and no direct biochemical analysis has been performed. In this study we used protein purification and mass spectrometry to identify Ser-62 as a single major site in vivo. Site-directed mutagenesis confirmed Ser-62 to be the site of Bcl-xL phosphorylation induced by several microtubule inhibitors tested. Vinblastine-treated cells overexpressing a Ser-62 3 Ala mutant showed highly significantly reduced apoptosis compared with cells expressing wild-type Bcl-xL. Co-immunoprecipitation revealed that phosphorylation caused wild-type Bcl-xL to release bound Bax, whereas phospho-defective Bcl-xL retained the ability to bind Bax. In contrast, phospho-mimic (Ser-62 3 Asp) Bcl-xL exhibited a reduced capacity to bind Bax. Functional tests were performed by transiently co-transfecting Bax in the context of different Bcl-xL mutants. Coexpression of wild-type or phospho-defective Bcl-xL counteracted the adverse effects of Bax expression on cell viability, whereas phospho-mimic Bcl-xL failed to provide the same level of protection against Bax. These studies suggest that Bcl-xL phosphorylation induced by microtubule inhibitors plays a key pro-apoptotic role at least in part by disabling the ability of Bcl-xL to bind Bax.

Mcl-1 is one of the major anti-apoptotic members of the Bcl-2 family of apoptotic regulatory proteins. In this study we investigated the role of Mcl-1 in mitotic arrest-induced apoptosis. Vinblastine treatment of KB-3 cells initially resulted in a phosphatase-sensitive mobility shift in Mcl-1 and then subsequent loss of Mcl-1 protein expression which was prevented by MG132, suggesting that phosphorylation triggered proteosome-mediated degradation. Mcl-1 phosphorylation/degradation was a specific response to microtubule inhibition and did not occur in response to lethal concentrations of DNA damaging agents. Vinblastine treatment caused degradation of Mcl-1 in cells in which apoptosis was blocked by Bcl-xL overexpression, indicating that Mcl-1 degradation was not a consequence of apoptosis. A partial reversible phosphorylation of Mcl-1 was observed in synchronized cells traversing mitosis, whereas more extensive phosphorylation and subsequent degradation of Mcl-1 was observed if synchronized cells were treated with vinblastine. Mcl-1 phosphorylation closely paralleled cyclin B expression, and specific cyclin-dependent kinase (Cdk) inhibitors blocked vinblastine-induced Mcl-1 phosphorylation, its subsequent degradation, and improved cell viability after mitotic arrest. Co-immunoprecipitation studies indicated that Mcl-1 was complexed with Bak, but not Bax or Noxa, in untreated cells, and that Bak became activated in concert with loss of Mcl-1 expression. These results suggest that Cdk1/cyclin B plays a key role in mitotic arrest-induced apoptosis via Mcl-1 phosphorylation, promoting its degradation and subsequently releasing Bak from sequestration.

Vinblastine and paclitaxel (Taxol) are widely used chemotherapeutic drugs that inhibit the normal function of microtubules causing mitotic arrest and cell death. Despite these similarities, the signaling pathways that mediate and regulate cell death induced by these agents remain incompletely understood. The purpose of this study was to directly compare the two drugs in terms of their ability to activate components of the c‐Jun N‐terminal protein kinase (JNK) pathway, and to establish the importance of these signaling events in apoptosis induced by these agents. We show that both drugs induce mitotic arrest and subsequent apoptotic cell death with highly similar kinetics and that both activate JNK and induce c‐Jun protein and c‐jun mRNA expression. Surprisingly, vinblastine induced c‐Jun phosphorylation and c‐jun transcriptional activation, although Taxol failed to do so. However, inhibition of JNK or an absence of JNK protected against both vinblastine‐ and Taxol‐induced cell death. These results suggest that although JNK activation plays an important role in cell death induced by both agents, vinblastine and Taxol differ markedly with respect to signaling downstream of JNK, with AP‐1‐dependent and ‐independent mechanisms, respectively. In addition, these results show, contrary to popular belief, that JNK activation is not necessarily accompanied by c‐Jun activation, and thus c‐Jun is not an obligate substrate of JNK.

Professional medical conferences over the past five years have seen an enormous increase in the use of Twitter in real-time, also known as "live-tweeting". At the United States and Canadian Academy of Pathology (USCAP) 2015 annual meeting, 24 attendees (the authors) volunteered to participate in a live-tweet group, the #InSituPathologists. This group, along with other attendees, kept the world updated via Twitter about the happenings at the annual meeting. There were 6,524 #USCAP2015 tweets made by 662 individual Twitter users; these generated 5,869,323 unique impressions (potential tweet-views) over a 13-day time span encompassing the dates of the annual meeting. Herein we document the successful implementation of the first official USCAP annual meeting live-tweet group, including the pros/cons of live-tweeting and other experiences of the original #InSituPathologists group members. No prior peer-reviewed publications to our knowledge have described in depth the use of an organized group to "live-tweet" a pathology meeting. We believe our group to be the first of its kind in the field of pathology.