Cyclin D-CDK4 kinase destabilizes PD-L1 via cullin 3-SPOP to control cancer immune surveillance
Jinfang Zhang, Xia Bu, Haizhen Wang, Yasheng Zhu, Yan Geng, Naoe Taira Nihira, Yuyong Tan, Yanpeng Ci, Fei Wu, Xiangpeng Dai, Jianping Guo, Yu-Han Huang, Caoqi Fan, Shancheng Ren, Yinghao Sun, Gordon J Freeman, Piotr Sicinski, Wenyi Wei, Jinfang Zhang, Xia Bu, Haizhen Wang, Yasheng Zhu, Yan Geng, Naoe Taira Nihira, Yuyong Tan, Yanpeng Ci, Fei Wu, Xiangpeng Dai, Jianping Guo, Yu-Han Huang, Caoqi Fan, Shancheng Ren, Yinghao Sun, Gordon J Freeman, Piotr Sicinski, Wenyi Wei
Abstract
Treatments that target immune checkpoints, such as the one mediated by programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) and its ligand PD-L1, have been approved for treating human cancers with durable clinical benefit. However, many patients with cancer fail to respond to compounds that target the PD-1 and PD-L1 interaction, and the underlying mechanism(s) is not well understood. Recent studies revealed that response to PD-1-PD-L1 blockade might correlate with PD-L1 expression levels in tumour cells. Hence, it is important to understand the mechanistic pathways that control PD-L1 protein expression and stability, which can offer a molecular basis to improve the clinical response rate and efficacy of PD-1-PD-L1 blockade in patients with cancer. Here we show that PD-L1 protein abundance is regulated by cyclin D-CDK4 and the cullin 3-SPOP E3 ligase via proteasome-mediated degradation. Inhibition of CDK4 and CDK6 (hereafter CDK4/6) in vivo increases PD-L1 protein levels by impeding cyclin D-CDK4-mediated phosphorylation of speckle-type POZ protein (SPOP) and thereby promoting SPOP degradation by the anaphase-promoting complex activator FZR1. Loss-of-function mutations in SPOP compromise ubiquitination-mediated PD-L1 degradation, leading to increased PD-L1 levels and reduced numbers of tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes in mouse tumours and in primary human prostate cancer specimens. Notably, combining CDK4/6 inhibitor treatment with anti-PD-1 immunotherapy enhances tumour regression and markedly improves overall survival rates in mouse tumour models. Our study uncovers a novel molecular mechanism for regulating PD-L1 protein stability by a cell cycle kinase and reveals the potential for using combination treatment with CDK4/6 inhibitors and PD-1-PD-L1 immune checkpoint blockade to enhance therapeutic efficacy for human cancers.
Conflict of interest statement
Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest
GF has patents/pending royalties on the PD-1 pathway from Roche, Merck, Bristol-Myers-Squibb, EMD-Serono, Boehringer-Ingelheim, AstraZeneca, Dako and Novartis. GF has served on advisory boards for CoStim, Novartis, Roche, Eli Lilly, Bristol-Myers-Squibb, Seattle Genetics, Bethyl Laboratories, Xios, and Quiet. PS in a consultant and a recipient of a research grant from Novartis. No potential conflicts of interests were disclosed by other authors.
The authors declare no competing financial interests.
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Source: PubMed