Cell, Volume 151, Issue 5, 937-950, (Nov 2012)
Huang et al.
“MED12 Controls the Response to Multiple Cancer Drugs through Regulation of TGF-β Receptor Signaling”
An unexpected role for a Mediator subunit, MED12, in resistance to multiple anticancer agents is revealed by Huang et al. Loss of MED12 confers drug resistance by activating transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) signaling. Inhibition of the TGF-β pathway resensitizes cells to therapeutic drugs, suggesting a new combinatorial cancer treatment.
Abstract– Inhibitors of the ALK and EGF receptor tyrosine kinases provoke dramatic but short-lived responses in lung cancers harboring EML4-ALK translocations or activating mutations of EGFR, respectively. We used a large-scale RNAi screen to identify MED12, a component of the transcriptional MEDIATOR complex that is mutated in cancers, as a determinant of response to ALK and EGFR inhibitors. MED12 is in part cytoplasmic where it negatively regulates TGF-βR2 through physical interaction. MED12 suppression therefore results in activation of TGF-βR signaling, which is both necessary and sufficient for drug resistance. TGF-β signaling causes MEK/ERK activation, and consequently MED12 suppression also confers resistance to MEK and BRAF inhibitors in other cancers. MED12 loss induces an EMT-like phenotype, which is associated with chemotherapy resistance in colon cancer patients and to gefitinib in lung cancer. Inhibition of TGF-βR signaling restores drug responsiveness in MED12KD cells, suggesting a strategy to treat drug-resistant tumors that have lost MED12.
