Focal adhesion kinase (FAK) is a nonreceptor tyrosine kinase (NRTK) with key roles in integrating growth and cell matrix adhesion signals, and FAK is a major driver of invasion and metastasis in cancer. Cell adhesion via integrin receptors is well known to trigger FAK signaling, and many of the players involved are known; however, mechanistically, FAK activation is not understood. Here, using a multidisciplinary approach, including biochemical, biophysical, structural, computational, and cell biology approaches, we provide a detailed view of a multistep activation mechanism of FAK initiated by phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate [PI(4,5)P 2 ]. Interestingly, the mechanism differs from canonical NRTK activation and is tailored to the dual catalytic and scaffolding function of FAK. We find PI(4,5)P 2 induces clustering of FAK on the lipid bilayer by binding a basic region in the regulatory 4.1, ezrin, radixin, moesin homology (FERM) domain. In these clusters, PI(4,5)P 2 induces a partially open FAK conformation where the autophosphorylation site is exposed, facilitating efficient autophosphorylation and subsequent Src recruitment. However, PI(4,5)P 2 does not release autoinhibitory interactions; rather, Src phosphorylation of the activation loop in FAK results in release of the FERM/kinase tether and full catalytic activation. We propose that PI(4,5)P 2 and its generation in focal adhesions by the enzyme phosphatidylinositol 4-phosphate 5-kinase type Iγ are important in linking integrin signaling to FAK activation.cell signaling | phosphoinositides C ell attachment to the ECM is mediated via integrin transmembrane receptors on the cell surface. Integrin engagement to ECM components results in activation and clustering of integrins. In response to integrin activation, a large number of proteins are recruited to their cytoplasmic tails, resulting in the formation of focal adhesions (FAs) (1). On the one side, FAs are anchoring points for actomyosin stress fibers, which allow tension forces to build up when contracting fibers exert their pulling force via FAs against the ECM. On the other hand, integrin activation and the generation of tension trigger intricate signaling cascades. A central signaling component in FAs is the nonreceptor tyrosine kinase (NRTK) focal adhesion kinase (FAK).

SH2-containing-inositol-5-phosphatases (SHIPs) dephosphorylate the 5-phosphate of phosphatidylinositol-3,4,5-trisphosphate (PI(3,4,5)P3) and play important roles in regulating the PI3K/Akt pathway in physiology and disease. Aiming to uncover interdomain regulatory mechanisms in SHIP2, we determined crystal structures containing the 5-phosphatase and a proximal region adopting a C2 fold. This reveals an extensive interface between the two domains, which results in significant structural changes in the phosphatase domain. Both the phosphatase and C2 domains bind phosphatidylserine lipids, which likely helps to position the active site towards its substrate. Although located distant to the active site, the C2 domain greatly enhances catalytic turnover. Employing molecular dynamics, mutagenesis and cell biology, we identify two distinct allosteric signaling pathways, emanating from hydrophobic or polar interdomain interactions, differentially affecting lipid chain or headgroup moieties of PI(3,4,5)P3. Together, this study reveals details of multilayered C2-mediated effects important for SHIP2 activity and points towards interesting new possibilities for therapeutic interventions.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.26640.001

The GPCR-OKB web application is freely available at http://www.gpcr-okb.org

A series of triazinic inhibitors of focal adhesion kinase (FAK) have been recently shown to exert antiangiogenic activity against HUVEC cells and anticancer efficacy against several cancer cell lines. We report herein that we further explored the heterocyclic core of these inhibitors by a fused imidazole ring with the triazine to provide imidazo[1,2-a][1,3,5]triazines. Importantly, these new compounds displayed 10(-7)-10(-8) M IC50 values, and the best inhibitor showed IC50 value of 50 nM against FAK enzymatic activity. Several inhibitors potently inhibited the proliferation of a panel of cancer cell lines expressing high levels of FAK. Apoptosis analysis in U87-MG and HCT-116 cell lines suggested that these compounds delayed cell cycle progression by arresting cells in the G2/M phase of the cell cycle, retarding cell growth. Further investigation demonstrated that these compounds strongly inhibited cell-matrix adhesion, migration, and invasion of U87-MG cells.

Despite the wide use of antiangiogenic drugs in the clinical setting, predictive biomarkers of response to these drugs are still unknown. We applied whole-exome sequencing of matched germline and basal plasma cell-free DNA samples (WES-cfDNA) on a wild-type metastatic colorectal cancer patient with primary resistance to standard treatment regimens, including inhibitors to the VEGF:VEGFR2 pathway. We performed extensive functional experiments, including ectopic expression of VEGFR2 mutants in different cell lines, kinase and drug sensitivity assays, and cell- and patient-derived xenografts. WES-cfDNA yielded a 77% concordance rate with tumor exome sequencing and enabled the identification of the /VEGFR2 L840F clonal, somatic mutation as the cause of therapy refractoriness in our patient. In addition, we found that 1% to 3% of samples from cancer sequencing projects harbor somatic mutations located in protein residues frequently mutated in other cancer-relevant kinases, such as EGFR, ABL1, and ALK. Our and functional assays confirmed that L840F causes strong resistance to antiangiogenic drugs, whereas the hot-spot mutant R1032Q confers sensitivity to strong VEGFR2 inhibitors. Moreover, we showed that the D717V, G800D, G800R, L840F, G843D, S925F, R1022Q, R1032Q, and S1100F VEGFR2 mutants promote tumor growth in mice. Our study supports WES-cfDNA as a powerful platform for portraying the somatic mutation landscape of cancer and discovery of new resistance mechanisms to cancer therapies. Importantly, we discovered that VEGFR2 is somatically mutated across tumor types and that VEGFR2 mutants can be oncogenic and control sensitivity/resistance to antiangiogenic drugs. .

A 3,5-dihydro-5-methylidene-4H-imidazol-4-one (MIO) electrophilic moiety is post-translationally and autocatalytically generated in homotetrameric histidine ammonia-lyase (HAL) and other enzymes containing the tripeptide Ala-Ser-Gly in a suitably positioned loop. The backbone cyclization step is identical to that taking place during fluorophore formation in green fluorescent protein from the tripeptide Ser-Tyr-Gly, but dehydration, rather than dehydrogenation by molecular oxygen, is the reaction that gives rise to the mature MIO ring system. To gain additional insight into this unique process and shed light on some still unresolved issues, we have made use of extensive molecular dynamics simulations and hybrid quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics calculations implementing the self-consistent charge density functional tight-binding method on a fully solvated tetramer of Pseudomonas putida HAL. Our results strongly support the idea that mechanical compression of the reacting loop by neighboring protein residues in the precursor state is absolutely required to prevent formation of inhibitory main-chain hydrogen bonds and to enforce proper alignment of donor and acceptor orbitals for bond creation. The consideration of the protein environment in our computations shows that water molecules, which have been mostly neglected in previous theoretical work, play a highly relevant role in the reaction mechanism and, more importantly, that backbone cyclization resulting from the nucleophilic attack of the Gly amide lone pair on the π* orbital of the Ala carbonyl precedes side-chain dehydration of the central serine.

Tris(trimethylsilyl)silane and azobis(cyclohexanenitrile) promoted the easy intramolecular arylation of aryl bromopyridine carbamates through a radical [1,6] ipso substitution process. These substrates showed a preference for this type of reaction over the alternative [1,7] addition. The results were rationalized by making use of quantum mechanical calculations and computer graphics.

<p>Table S5: List of KDR/VEGFR2 somatic mutations from the Cosmic, TCGA, GENIE and PCA-WGS databases.</p>