Aging is a major risk factor for both genetic and sporadic neurodegenerative disorders. However, it is unclear how aging interacts with genetic predispositions to promote neurodegeneration. Here, we investigate how partial loss of function of TBK1, a major genetic cause for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) comorbidity, leads to age-dependent neurodegeneration. We show that TBK1 is an endogenous inhibitor of RIPK1 and the embryonic lethality of Tbk1 mice is dependent on RIPK1 kinase activity. In aging human brains, another endogenous RIPK1 inhibitor, TAK1, exhibits a marked decrease in expression. We show that in Tbk1 mice, the reduced myeloid TAK1 expression promotes all the key hallmarks of ALS/FTD, including neuroinflammation, TDP-43 aggregation, axonal degeneration, neuronal loss, and behavior deficits, which are blocked upon inhibition of RIPK1. Thus, aging facilitates RIPK1 activation by reducing TAK1 expression, which cooperates with genetic risk factors to promote the onset of ALS/FTD.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), is the ongoing global pandemic that poses substantial challenges to public health worldwide. A subset of COVID-19 patients experience systemic inflammatory response, known as cytokine storm, which may lead to death. Receptor-interacting serine/threonine-protein kinase 1 (RIPK1) is an important mediator of inflammation and cell death. Here, we examined the interaction of RIPK1-mediated innate immunity with SARS-CoV-2 infection. We found evidence of RIPK1 activation in human COVID-19 lung pathological samples, and cultured human lung organoids and ACE2 transgenic mice infected by SARS-CoV-2. Inhibition of RIPK1 using multiple small-molecule inhibitors reduced the viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in human lung organoids. Furthermore, therapeutic dosing of the RIPK1 inhibitor Nec-1s reduced mortality and lung viral load, and blocked the CNS manifestation of SARS-CoV-2 in ACE2 transgenic mice. Mechanistically, we found that the RNA-dependent RNA polymerase of SARS-CoV-2, NSP12, a highly conserved central component of coronaviral replication and transcription machinery, promoted the activation of RIPK1. Furthermore, NSP12 323L variant, encoded by the SARS-CoV-2 C14408T variant first detected in Lombardy, Italy, that carries a Pro323Leu amino acid substitution in NSP12, showed increased ability to activate RIPK1. Inhibition of RIPK1 downregulated the transcriptional induction of proinflammatory cytokines and host factors including ACE2 and EGFR that promote viral entry into cells. Our results suggest that SARS-CoV-2 may have an unexpected and unusual ability to hijack the RIPK1-mediated host defense response to promote its own propagation and that inhibition of RIPK1 may provide a therapeutic option for the treatment of COVID-19.

RIPK1 is a critical mediator of cell death and inflammation downstream of TNFR1 upon stimulation by TNFα, a potent proinflammatory cytokine involved in a multitude of human inflammatory and degenerative diseases. RIPK1 contains an N-terminal kinase domain, an intermediate domain, and a C-terminal death domain (DD). The kinase activity of RIPK1 promotes cell death and inflammation. Here, we investigated the involvement of RIPK1-DD in the regulation of RIPK1 kinase activity. We show that a charge-conserved mutation of a lysine located on the surface of DD (K599R in human RIPK1 or K584R in murine RIPK1) blocks RIPK1 activation in necroptosis and RIPK1-dependent apoptosis and the formation of complex II. knockin mutant cells are resistant to RIPK1 kinase-dependent apoptosis and necroptosis. The resistance of K584R cells, however, can be overcome by forced dimerization of RIPK1. Finally, we show that the K584R RIPK1 knockin mutation protects mice against TNFα-induced systematic inflammatory response syndrome. Our study demonstrates the role of RIPK1-DD in mediating RIPK1 dimerization and activation of its kinase activity during necroptosis and RIPK1-dependent apoptosis.

Vacuolar protein-sorting 34 (Vps34), the catalytic subunit in the class III PtdIns3 (phosphatidylinositol 3) kinase complexes, mediates the production of PtdIns3P, a key intracellular lipid involved in regulating autophagy and receptor degradation. However, the signal transduction pathways by which extracellular signals regulate Vps34 complexes and the downstream cellular mechanisms are not well understood. Here we show that DNA damageactivated mitotic arrest and CDK activation lead to the phosphorylation of Vps34, which provides a signal to promote its ubiquitination and proteasomal degradation mediated by FBXL20 (an F-box protein) and the associated Skp1 (S-phase kinase-associated protein-1)-Cullin1 complex, leading to inhibition of autophagy and receptor endocytosis. Furthermore, we show that the expression of FBXL20 is regulated by p53-dependent transcription. Our study provides a molecular pathway by which DNA damage regulates Vps34 complexes and its downstream mechanisms, including autophagy and receptor endocytosis, through SCF (Skp1-Cul1-F-box)-mediated ubiquitination and degradation. Since the expression of FBXL20 is regulated by p53-dependent transcription, the control of Vps34 ubiquitination and proteasomal degradation by FBXL20 and the associated SCF complex expression provides a novel checkpoint for p53 to regulate autophagy and receptor degradation in DNA damage response.

3 Technical Efficacy Stage: 2 J. MAGN. RESON. IMAGING 2018.

No abstract

Triapine, an iron chelator that inhibits ribonucleotide reductase, has been evaluated in clinical trials for cancer treatment. Triapine in combination with other chemotherapeutic agents shows promising efficacy in certain hematologic malignancies; however, it is less effective against many advanced solid tumors, probably due to the unsatisfactory potency and pharmacokinetic properties. In this report, we developed a triapine derivative IC25 (10) with potent antitumor activity. 10 Preferentially inhibited the proliferation of hematopoietic cancers by inducing mitochondria reactive oxygen species production and mitochondrial dysfunction. Unlike triapine, 10 executed cytotoxic action in a copper-dependent manner. 10-Induced up-expression of thioredoxin-interacting protein resulted in decreased thioredoxin activity to permit c-Jun N-terminal kinase and p38 activation and ultimately led to the execution of the cell death program. Remarkedly, 10 showed good bioavailability and inhibited tumor growth in mouse xenograft models. Taken together, our study identifies compound 10 as a copper-dependent antitumor agent, which may be applied to the treatment of hematopoietic cancers.

Adoptive T lymphocyte immunotherapy is one of the most promising methods to treat residual lesions after glioma surgery. However, the fate of the adoptively transferred T-cells in vivo is unclear, hampering the understanding of this emerging therapy. Thus, it is highly desirable to develop noninvasive and quantitative in vivo tracking of these T-cells to glioma for better identification of the migratory fate and to provide objective evaluation of outcomes of adoptive T-cell immunotherapy targeting glioma. In this work, ultrasmall T MR-based nanoprobes, NaGdF -TAT, as molecular probes with high longitudinal relaxivity (8.93 mm s ) are designed. By means of HIV-1 transactivator (TAT) peptides, nearly 95% of the adoptive T-cells are labeled with the NaGdF -TAT nanoprobes without any measurable side effects on the labeled T-cells, which is remarkably superior to that of the control fluorescein isothiocyanate-NaGdF concerning labeling efficacy. Labeled adoptive T-cell clusters can be sensitively tracked in an orthotopic GL261-glioma model 24 h after intravenous infusion of 10 labeled T-cells by T -weighted MR imaging. Both in vitro and in vivo experiments show that the NaGdF -TAT nanoprobes labeling of T-cells may be a promising method to track adoptive T-cells to improve our understanding of the pathophysiology in adoptive immunotherapy for gliomas.