ApoL6 Induces Dichotomous Cell Death Phenotype Involving Both Apoptosis and Necroptosis in Cancer Cells

Author Info

Isabella Murphy Guanghua Wan Shulin Fu Yulan Liu Yinsheng Qiu Thomas Ma Warren Laskey Hitendra Chand Larry Sklar Chien-An Andy Hu

Corresponding Author

Chien-An Andy Hu
Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of New Mexico School of Medicine, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

A B S T R A C T

Apolipoprotein L6 (ApoL6) is a pro-death, BH3-only and phospholipid-binding member of the Bcl-2 family. Previously, we showed that ectopic expression of ApoL6 induces mitochondria-mediated apoptosis. In this study, we hypothesized that ApoL6 plays a dichotomous role in regulated cell death (RCD) pathways that involves both apoptosis and necroptosis. Necroptosis, or programmed necrosis, can occur simultaneously or alternatively to apoptosis as a caspase-independent pathway, and is characterized by the formation of intracellular necrosomes and plasma membrane pores. The pseudokinase mixed lineage kinase domain-like protein (MLKL) interacts with the necrosome to become phosphorylated and activated. Phosphorylated (p-) MLKL molecules migrate to the plasma membrane to form pores, disrupt membrane integrity, and selectively release intracellular components. The proinflammatory cytokine IL-1β is amongst a number of molecules released in this process. To investigate the role of ApoL6 in RCD, ApoL6 was overexpressed via a Tet-Off gene inducible system in a p53 null colorectal cancer cell line DLD-1. Necroptotic cell death was marked by an increased level of intracellular and plasma membrane p-MLKL and extracellular release of IL-1β along with the disruption of the plasma membrane. We found that in the presence of apoptotic inhibitors, levels of necroptotic cell death increased, indicating an enhanced push away from apoptosis. We also showed that ApoL6 preferentially binds with phosphatidylinositol phosphate species (PIPs), which include PI (4,5) P2, PI4P and PI5P. Thus, we expand on the role of ApoL6 in RCD to induce a mixed cell-death phenotype that includes both apoptosis and necroptosis.

Article Info

Article Type

Research Article

Publication history

Received: Fri 12, Jun 2020
Accepted: Sat 11, Jul 2020
Published: Tue 21, Jul 2020

Copyright

© 2023 Chien-An Andy Hu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Hosting by Science Repository.
DOI: 10.31487/j.COR.2020.07.12