Regulation of nuclear receptor activity is the focus of numerous ongoing studies to develop novel therapies for the treatment of hormone-related cancer. Although cyclin D1 functions to control the activity of several nuclear receptors, the region(s) of the protein responsible for such transcriptional comodulation remain poorly defined. Herein, we map the region of cyclin D1 required for binding and repression of the androgen receptor (AR) to a central, exclusively a-helical domain. Deletion of this domain disrupted AR binding and corepressor activity. Further investigations showed that this domain is sufficient for AR interaction and possesses the ability to bind histone deacetylase 3. Strikingly, overexpression of this repressor region attenuates cell cycle progression in prostatic adenocarcinoma cells. The requirement of this domain for nuclear receptor repression was conserved with respect to thyroid hormone receptor beta-1, whereas cyclin D1 activation of the estrogen receptor occurred independently of the central region. Together, these data identify a minimal repression module within cyclin D1 and demonstrate that the coactivator and corepressor functions of cyclin D1 are distinct. In addition, our data suggest that properties of the cyclin D1 central domain could be exploited to develop novel prostate cancer therapeutics.

The androgen receptor (AR) is a member of the nuclear receptor superfamily, the activity of which is critical for the development and progression of prostate cancer. We and others have previously demonstrated that cyclin D1 is a potent corepressor of the AR. Although cyclin D1 is suspected to recruit histone deacetylases to the AR complex, previous studies have demonstrated that this activity alone is insufficient for cyclin D1 function. Here, we uncover a novel, secondary means of cyclin D1-mediated repression, through modulation of AR amino-carboxy terminal interactions. We show that cyclin D1 predominantly binds the N-terminal domain of the AR, dependent on the AR 23FxxLF27 motif. Through this motif, cyclin D1 abrogates the ability of the AR N-terminal domain to interact with the C terminus. Secondary amino-terminal domain sites capable of fostering interaction with the C terminus were refractory to cyclin D1 action, indicating that the ability of cyclin D1 to modulate AR amino-carboxy terminal interactions is specific to 23FxxLF27. Deletion of the N-terminal cyclin D1 binding site severely compromised AR activity (due to loss of FxxLF) but unmasked a repressor action through interaction with the AR C terminus. In summary, these data reveal novel, unexpected mechanisms of cyclin D1 activity and demonstrate that this function of cyclin D1 is critical for AR modulation.

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