Cisplatin is one of the most effective and widely used anticancer agents for the treatment of several types of tumors. The cytotoxic effect of cisplatin is thought to be mediated primarily by the generation of nuclear DNA adducts, which, if not repaired, cause cell death as a consequence of DNA replication and transcription blockage. However, the ability of cisplatin to induce nuclear DNA (nDNA) damage per se is not sufficient to explain its high degree of effectiveness nor the toxic effects exerted on normal, post-mitotic tissues. Oxidative damage has been observed in vivo following exposure to cisplatin in several tissues, suggesting a role for oxidative stress in the pathogenesis of cisplatin-induced dose-limiting toxicities. However, the mechanism of cisplatin-induced generation of ROS and their contribution to cisplatin cytotoxicity in normal and cancer cells is still poorly understood. By employing a panel of normal and cancer cell lines and the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae as model system, we show that exposure to cisplatin induces a mitochondrial-dependent ROS response that significantly enhances the cytotoxic effect caused by nDNA damage. ROS generation is independent of the amount of cisplatin-induced nDNA damage and occurs in mitochondria as a consequence of protein synthesis impairment. The contribution of cisplatin-induced mitochondrial dysfunction in determining its cytotoxic effect varies among cells and depends on mitochondrial redox status, mitochondrial DNA integrity and bioenergetic function. Thus, by manipulating these cellular parameters, we were able to enhance cisplatin cytotoxicity in cancer cells. This study provides a new mechanistic insight into cisplatin-induced cell killing and may lead to the design of novel therapeutic strategies to improve anticancer drug efficacy.

Integrin-mediated reorganization of cell shape leads to an altered cellular phenotype. Disruption of the actin cytoskeleton, initiated by binding of soluble antibody to alpha5beta1 integrin, led to increased expression of the collagenase-1 gene in rabbit synovial fibroblasts. Activation of the guanosine triphosphate-binding protein Rac1, which was downstream of the integrin, was necessary for this process, and expression of activated Rac1 was sufficient to increase expression of collagenase-1. Rac1 activation generated reactive oxygen species that were essential for nuclear factor kappa B-dependent transcriptional regulation of interleukin-1alpha, which, in an autocrine manner, induced collagenase-1 gene expression. Remodeling of the extracellular matrix and consequent alterations of integrin-mediated adhesion and cytoarchitecture are central to development, wound healing, inflammation, and malignant disease. The resulting activation of Rac1 may lead to altered gene regulation and alterations in cellular morphogenesis, migration, and invasion.

SUMMARY DNA double-strand break (DSB) repair by homologous recombination (HR) is initiated by CtIP/MRN-mediated DNA end resection to maintain genome integrity. SAMHD1 is a dNTP triphosphohydrolase, which restricts HIV-1 infection, and mutations are associated with Aicardi-Goutières syndrome and cancer. We show that SAMHD1 has a dNTPase-independent function in promoting DNA end resection to facilitate DSB repair by HR. SAMHD1 deficiency or Vpx-mediated degradation causes hypersensitivity to DSB-inducing agents, and SAMHD1 is recruited to DSBs. SAMHD1 complexes with CtIP via a conserved carboxyl-terminal domain and recruits CtIP to DSBs to facilitate end resection and HR. Significantly, a cancer-associated mutant with impaired CtIP interaction but not dNTPase-inactive SAMHD1 fails to rescue the end resection impairment of SAMHD1 depletion. Our findings define a dNTPase-independent function for SAMHD1 in HR-mediated DSB repair by facilitating CtIP accrual to promote DNA end resection, providing insight into how SAMHD1 promotes genome integrity and prevents disease, including cancer.

Synaptic vesicles (SV) are generated by two different mechanisms, one AP-2 dependent and one AP-3 dependent. It has been uncertain, however, whether these mechanisms generate SV that differ in molecular composition. We explored this hypothesis by analyzing the targeting of ZnT3 and synaptophysin both to PC12 synaptic-like microvesicles (SLMV) as well as SV isolated from wild-type and AP-3-deficient mocha brains. ZnT3 cytosolic tail interacted selectively with AP-3 in cell-free assays. Accordingly, pharmacological disruption of either AP-2-or AP-3-dependent SLMV biogenesis preferentially reduced synaptophysin or ZnT3 targeting, respectively; suggesting that these antigens were concentrated in different vesicles. As predicted, immuno-isolated SLMV revealed that ZnT3 and synaptophysin were enriched in different vesicle populations. Likewise, morphological and biochemical analyses in hippocampal neurons indicated that these two antigens were also present in distinct but overlapping domains. ZnT3 SV content was reduced in AP-3-deficient neurons, but synaptophysin was not altered in the AP-3 null background. Our evidence indicates that neuroendocrine cells assemble molecularly heterogeneous SV and suggests that this diversity could contribute to the functional variety of synapses. INTRODUCTIONThe molecular diversity in total brain synaptic vesicle (SV) composition is generally presumed to result from differential expression of synaptic vesicle membrane proteins in different brain regions. However, the possibility that synaptic vesicles differ in composition because of different biogenesis mechanisms has not been explored. Different vesiculation pathways could result in molecularly diverse synaptic vesicles. Vesiculation mechanisms are known to produce distinct cargo carriers from a population of donor membranes (Bonifacino and Dell'Angelica, 1999;Springer et al., 1999;Boehm and Bonifacino, 2001). This process is achieved by adaptor complexes that recognize and concentrate specific membrane proteins in the donor membranes (Bonifacino and Dell 'Angelica, 1999;Kirchhausen, 1999). PC12 cells have been shown to possess two such adaptor-dependent pathways for the assembly of synaptic vesicles, also known as synaptic-like microvesicles (SLMV) (Shi et al., 1998;de Wit et al., 1999;Jarousse and Kelly, 2001). In one pathway, SLMV are generated from the plasma membrane by a vesiculation mechanism that requires the adaptor AP-2, clathrin, and the GTPase dynamin (Shi et al., 1998). In the second pathway, SLMV are generated from endosomes by the adaptor complex AP-3 (Faundez et al., 1998;Blumstein et al., 2001) and the GTPase ARF1 (Faundez et al., 1997). In contrast to the plasma membrane pathway, the endosomederived mechanism is highly sensitive to brefeldin A (BFA) (Shi et al., 1998).Phenotypes observed in the AP-3-deficient mocha mouse are consistent with a role for the AP-3-dependent, endosome-derived pathway in neurons (Kantheti et al., 1998). The mocha mossy fibers are devoid of both the synaptic vesiclespecific zinc transpor...

Mutational analyses have revealed many genes that are required for proper biogenesis of lysosomes and lysosome-related organelles. The proteins encoded by these genes assemble into five distinct complexes (AP-3, BLOC-1-3, and HOPS) that either sort membrane proteins or interact with SNAREs. Several of these seemingly distinct complexes cause similar phenotypic defects when they are rendered defective by mutation, but the underlying cellular mechanism is not understood. Here, we show that the BLOC-1 complex resides on microvesicles that also contain AP-3 subunits and membrane proteins that are known AP-3 cargoes. Mouse mutants that cause BLOC-1 or AP-3 deficiencies affected the targeting of LAMP1, phosphatidylinositol-4-kinase type II alpha, and VAMP7-TI. VAMP7-TI is an R-SNARE involved in vesicle fusion with late endosomes/lysosomes, and its cellular levels were selectively decreased in cells that were either AP-3-or BLOC-1-deficient. Furthermore, BLOC-1 deficiency selectively altered the subcellular distribution of VAMP7-TI cognate SNAREs. These results indicate that the BLOC-1 and AP-3 protein complexes affect the targeting of SNARE and non-SNARE AP-3 cargoes and suggest a function of the BLOC-1 complex in membrane protein sorting. INTRODUCTIONMembrane enclosed organelles possess distinctive protein compositions maintained by vesicle formation and vesicle fusion mechanisms. Vesicles are formed by coat and coat accessory molecules that selectively regulate the concentration of specific membrane proteins into departing vesicles. Once formed, vesicle contents are delivered to target membranes by vesicle fusion. This process depends on the pairing of fusogenic membrane proteins generically known as R-or vesicle (v)-SNAREs and Q-or target (t)-SNAREs (Springer et al., 1999;Bonifacino and Glick, 2004;Hong, 2005). Vesicle formation by coats and fusion by SNAREs is likely to be coordinately regulated, as suggested by the specific subcellular localizations that coats and SNAREs possess (Robinson, 2004;Hong, 2005). Predictably, coats either interact with and/or sort SNAREs. However, SNARE sorting mechanisms have been described only for a limited number of the SNAREs known to eukaryotic cells (Gurkan et al., 2005). For example, COPII interacts/sorts the R-(v)-SNAREs Bos1p and Bet1p into vesicles (Matsuoka et al., 1998;Springer and Schekman, 1998); the adaptors GGA1-2 sort the yeast Q-(t)-SNARE Pep12p (Black and Pelham, 2000); epsinR sorts/interacts with the Q-(t)-SNARE Vti1b (Hirst et al., 2004); the adaptor complex AP-3 sorts or interacts with the R-(v)-SNAREs VAMP7-TI (Martinez-Arca et al., 2003) and engineered variants of VAMP2 (Salem et al., 1998); and the adaptor complex AP-1 sorts/interacts with VAMP4 (Peden et al., 2001). These coat-SNARE interactions define prebudding interactions of the vesicle sorting and fusion machineries. However, it is poorly understood in vertebrates whether 1) these interactions persist at later stages once a vesicle is formed and cargo concentration is completed and 2) if molecules or com...