Kim, Suil, Aaron J. Schein, and Jay A. Nadel. E-cadherin promotes EGFR-mediated cell differentiation and MUC5AC mucin expression in cultured human airway epithelial cells. Am J Physiol Lung Cell Mol Physiol 289: L1049 -L1060, 2005. First published July 29, 2005; doi:10.1152/ajplung.00388.2004In previous work, we showed that epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) activation causes mucin expression in airway epithelium in vivo and in human NCI-H292 airway epithelial cells and normal human bronchial epithelial (NHBE) cells in vitro. Here we show that the cell surface adhesion molecule, E-cadherin, promotes EGFR-mediated mucin production in NCI-H292 cells in a cell density-and cell cycle-dependent fashion. The addition of the EGFR ligand, transforming growth factor (TGF)-␣, increased MUC5AC protein expression markedly in dense, but not in sparse, cultures. MUC5AC-positive cells in dense cultures contained 2 N DNA content and did not incorporate bromodeoxyuridine, suggesting that they develop via cell differentiation and that a surface molecule involved in cell-cell contact is important for EGFRmediated mucin production. In support of this hypothesis, in dense cultures of NCI-H292 cells and in NHBE cells at air-liquid interface, blockade of E-cadherin-mediated cell-cell contacts decreased EGFRdependent mucin production. E-cadherin blockade also increased EGFR-dependent cell proliferation and TGF-␣-induced EGFR tyrosine phosphorylation in dense cultures of NCI-H292 cells, suggesting that E-cadherin promotes EGFR-dependent mucin production and inhibits EGFR-dependent cell proliferation via modulation of EGFR phosphotyrosine levels. Furthermore, in dense cultures, E-cadherin blockade decreased the rate of EGFR tyrosine dephosphorylation, implicating an E-cadherin-dependent protein tyrosine phosphatase in EGFR dephosphorylation. Thus E-cadherin promotes EGFR-mediated cell differentiation and MUC5AC production, and our results suggest that this occurs via a pathway involving protein tyrosine phosphatase-dependent EGFR dephosphorylation. epidermal growth factor receptor; airway epithelium THE PRODUCTION OF MUCIN-CONTAINING goblet cells in the airways is an important feature in diseases of mucus hypersecretion such as asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cystic fibrosis, nasal polyps, and bronchiectasis (reviewed in Ref. 38). Several years ago, Takeyama et al. (61) showed that epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) activation causes mucin production in airway epithelial cells in vivo and in human NCI-H292 airway epithelial cells in vitro. Subsequent studies have implicated EGFR activation in mucin upregulation (44) by many stimuli (7, 24, 26, 31, 32, 50 -52, 60, 62), suggesting that the EGFR cascade is a convergent pathway for mucin production by airway epithelial (goblet) cells.Biological responses to EGFR signaling are pleiotropic and include proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis (reviewed in Ref. 19). In multicellular organisms, cell neighbors influence cell growth and differentiation. When normal e...