B-cell lymphoma (BCL) is the most common hematologic malignancy. While sequencing studies gave insights into BCL genetics, identification of non-mutated cancer genes remains challenging. Here, we describe PiggyBac transposon tools and mouse models for recessive screening and show their application to study clonal B-cell lymphomagenesis. In a genome-wide screen, we discover BCL genes related to diverse molecular processes, including signaling, transcriptional regulation, chromatin regulation, or RNA metabolism. Cross-species analyses show the efficiency of the screen to pinpoint human cancer drivers altered by non-genetic mechanisms, including clinically relevant genes dysregulated epigenetically, transcriptionally, or post-transcriptionally in human BCL. We also describe a CRISPR/Cas9-based in vivo platform for BCL functional genomics, and validate discovered genes, such as Rfx7 , a transcription factor, and Phip , a chromatin regulator, which suppress lymphomagenesis in mice. Our study gives comprehensive insights into the molecular landscapes of BCL and underlines the power of genome-scale screening to inform biology.

Millions of individuals older than 50-years suffer from age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Associated with this multifactorial disease are polymorphisms of complement factor genes and a main environmental risk factoroxidative stress. Until now the linkage between these risk factors for AMD has not been fully understood. Recent studies, integrating results on oxidative stress, complement activation, epidemiology and ocular pathology suggested the following sequence in AMD-etiology: initially, chronic oxidative stress results in modification of proteins and lipids in the posterior of the eye; these tissue alterations trigger chronic inflammation, involving the complement system; and finally, invasive immune cells facilitate pathology in the retina. Here, we summarize the results for animal studies which aim to elucidate this molecular interplay of oxidative events and tissue-specific complement activation in the eye.Luciana M. Pujol-Lereis and Nicole Schäfer both have contributed equally to the study.

Members of the RAF family of serine-threonine kinases are intermediates in the mitogen-activated protein kinase and extracellular signal–regulated kinase (MAPK-ERK) signaling pathway, which controls key differentiation processes in B cells. By analyzing mice with B cell–specific deletion of Raf1, Braf, or both, we showed that Raf-1 and B-Raf acted together in mediating the positive selection of pre-B and transitional B cells as well as in initiating plasma cell differentiation. However, genetic or chemical inactivation of RAFs led to increased ERK phosphorylation in mature B cells. ERK activation in the absence of Raf-1 and B-Raf was mediated by multiple RAF-independent pathways, with phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K) playing an important role. Furthermore, we found that ERK phosphorylation strongly increased during the transition from activated B cells to pre-plasmablasts. This increase in ERK phosphorylation did not occur in B cells lacking both Raf-1 and B-Raf, which most likely explains the partial block of plasma cell differentiation in mice lacking both RAFs. Collectively, our data indicate that B-Raf and Raf-1 are not necessary to mediate ERK phosphorylation in naïve or activated B cells but are essential for mediating the marked increase in ERK phosphorylation during the transition from activated B cells to pre-plasmablasts.

Activation of CD40-signaling contributes to the initiation, progression and drug resistance of B cell lymphomas. We contributed to this knowledge by showing that constitutive CD40-signaling in B cells induces B cell hyperplasia and finally B cell lymphoma development in transgenic mice. CD40 activates, among others, the non-canonical NF-ĸB signaling, which is constitutively activated in several human B cell lymphomas and is therefore presumed to contribute to lymphopathogenesis. This prompted us to study the regulatory role of the non-canonical NF-ĸB transcription factor RelB in lymphomagenesis. To this end, we crossed mice expressing a constitutively active CD40 receptor in B cells with conditional RelB-KO mice. Ablation of RelB attenuated pre-malignant B cell expansion, and resulted in an impaired survival and activation of long-term CD40-stimulated B cells. Furthermore, we found that hyperactivation of non-canonical NF-кB signaling enhances the retention of B cells in the follicles of secondary lymphoid organs. RNA-Seq-analysis revealed that several genes involved in B-cell migration, survival, proliferation and cytokine signaling govern the transcriptional differences modulated by the ablation of RelB in long-term CD40-stimulated B cells. Inactivation of RelB did not abrogate lymphoma development. However, lymphomas occurred with a lower incidence and had a longer latency period. In summary, our data suggest that RelB, although it is not strictly required for malignant transformation, accelerates the lymphomagenesis of long-term CD40-stimulated B cells by regulating genes involved in migration, survival and cytokine signaling.

The non-canonical NF-κB pathway is highly conserved, can be activated by TNF-receptors e.g. CD40 and is dysregulated in several lymphomas (Krappmann and Vincendeau 2016). In human DLBCL hyper-activation of the non-canonical NF-kB signaling pathway could be detected in about 15% (Zhang et al. 2015). Upon activation of the non-canonical NF-κB pathway RelB is translocated to the nucleus and acts as transcription factor. RelB is important to maintain viability of a Hodgkin Lymphoma cell line (Ranuncolo et al. 2012), but interestingly B cell specific inactivation of RelB in mature B cells of transgenic mice have only a minor effect on B cell maintenance and activation (De Silva et al. 2016). Therefore it is still elusive, whether RelB-regulated genes contribute to lymphoma development. To study the contribution of RelB-regulated genes to lymphoma development we used a mouse model expressing a constitutively active CD40 receptor in B cells (LMP1/CD40stopflmice). LMP1/CD40 is a fusion protein comprising the signaling domain of human CD40 and the transmembrane domain of LMP1 and promotes a persistently activation of CD40 signaling. In LMP1/CD40stopfl//CD19-Cre (LMP1/CD40) mice the constitutive CD40 activation leads to the selective activation of the non-canonical NF-kB pathway and the MAP kinase pathways JNK and ERK. LMP1/CD40-expression positively affects cell survival and proliferation of B cells resulting in a B cell expansion and accumulation of B cells in follicles of young mice. Mice older than 12 months develop lymphomas with a high incidence. In most cases the lymphoma was monoclonal and had the phenotype B220low, CD21- and CD23- (Hojer et al. 2014; Hömig-Hölzel et al. 2008). Recently, we observed that this aberrant population appears at around 6 months of age and increases continuously during the aging process. To unveil the contribution of the non-canonical NF-κB pathway to the phenotype and lymphoma development of constitutively CD40-activated B cells we crossed conditional RelBfl/fl mice to LMP1/CD40stopfl//CD19-Cre mice (RelBKO//LMP1/CD40 mice). In young mice we were able to observe that LMP1/CD40 B cells without functional RelB were less expanded in the spleen and lymph nodes, but had elevated B cell numbers in the blood and a higher number of recirculating B cells in the bone marrow. This indicates that RelB-regulated genes are important for the retention of CD40-activated B cells in B cell follicles of secondary lymphoid organs. In addition, the survival of ex vivo isolated LMP1/CD40-expressing RelB-deficient B cells was diminished in comparison to LMP1/CD40-expressing RelB-proficent B cells, but RelBKO//LMP1/CD40 B cells still survived better than control B cells. Furthermore, we found that RelBKO//LMP1/CD40 B cells were less activated than LMP1/CD40 B cells, but had a higher expression of the tested activation markers than control B cells. In order to characterize the influence of RelB-regulated genes on lymphoma development in LMP1/CD40 mice we analyzed LMP1/CD40-expressing mice at different time points. The aberrant population, arising in LMP1/CD40 mice, was also detectable in aged RelBKO//LMP1/CD40 mice, though showed a delayed progression and always had a lower expansion than in age-matched LMP1/CD40 mice. Both transgenic mice developed monoclonal lymphomas. However, the double mutant mice had a lower tumor incidence than LMP1/CD40 mice with functional RelB. Nevertheless, the risk of lymphoma development in RelBKO//LMP1/CD40 was still higher than in wildtype mice. In the last part of this study we performed a RNA-Seq. analysis to see which genes are RelB-dependent in chronically CD40-activated B cells. We identified several RelB-dependent genes and 21 of these had been correlated with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. Some of these candidates could be promising new therapy targets and are under further investigation. In conclusion we provide evidence that RelB-regulated genes contribute to the survival and activation of B cells, which are chronically activated by CD40 signaling. Furthermore, we found that CD40 signaling enhances the retention of B cells in B cell follicles through activation of the non-canonical NF-kB pathway. Moreover, we demonstrated that RelB-regulated genes contribute to B cell lymphomagenesis and identified several RelB-regulated genes that may contribute to the expansion and lymphomagenesis of B cells receiving a chronic CD40 signal. Disclosures Weigert: Roche: Research Funding; Novartis: Research Funding.