Abstract 5455: Differential regulation of E2A (TCF3) by androgens in prostate cancer cells.
Authors: Patel Divya , Chaudhary Jaideep 
Published: August 2014

Introduction: E2A (TCF3) is a multifunctional basic helix loop helix (bHLH) transcription factor. E2A promotes cell differentiation, acts as a negative regulator of cell proliferation in normal cells and cancer cell lines and is required for normal B-cell development. Previous studies from our laboratory has shown that E2A expression is highly increased in prostate cancer as compared to normal prostate and that it acts as a tumor promoter in prostate cancer. Given the diverse biological pathways regulated/ influenced by E2A little is known about its regulation in prostate cancer.

Experimental design: E2A expression in androgen sensitive LNCaP and insensitive C81 prostate cancer cell lines was determined by western blot after treatments with androgen receptor (AR) agonist R1881 and antagonist casodex. Putative Androgen Response Elements (ARE) were identified in the first intronic region of the E2A gene using some of the online bioinformatics tools and confirmed by Chromatin Immunoprecipitation (ChIP) with AR antibody and Luciferase reporter assays on the above mentioned cell lines after treatments with R1881 and casodex.

Results: E2A expression was found to increase with the increasing aggrasiveness of prostate cancer cell lines as compared to normal prostate epithelial cell line RWPE1. When androgen responsive cell line LNCaP was treated with R1881 there was an increased expression of E2A which decreased upon treatment with antiandrogen casodex whereas the E2A expression remained unaltered upon similar treatments in androgen insensitive cell line C81. The first intronic region of the E2A gene was predicted to contain two putative ARE sites. ChIP after treatment of LNCaP and C81 cells with R1881 and casodex showed that the intronic region was bound by AR in LNCaP cells only in the presence of R1881, whereas C81 cells showed a pulldown with AR in presence as well as absence of R1881. Similar results were observed in luciferase reporter assays indicating that E2A is transactivated by AR in LNCaP cell lines whereas it is independent of androgens in C81 cell line. Furthermore, Luciferase reporter assays also confirmed that only one of the two predicted putative AREs was functionally active and responsible for the androgen mediated regulation of E2A.

Conclusion: Our results indicate that E2A is differentially regulated in Prostate cancer cell lines. The increased expression of E2A and its role as a tumor promoter in prostate cancer cell lines may be contributed to its loss of androgen dependence as is evident in its progression from androgen dependent LNCaP to independent C81 cells.

Acknowledgements: This study was supported by NIH/NCI RO1 CA128914 and NIH/NCRR/RCMI G12RR03062.

Citation Format: Divya Patel, Jaideep Chaudhary. Differential regulation of E2A (TCF3) by androgens in prostate cancer cells. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 104th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2013 Apr 6-10; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2013;73(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 5455. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2013-5455