Regulatory Function of Whey Acidic Protein in the Proliferation of Mouse Mammary Epithelial Cells in Vivo and in Vitro
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Elsevier - Publisher Connector Developmental Biology 274 (2004) 31–44 www.elsevier.com/locate/ydbio Regulatory function of whey acidic protein in the proliferation of mouse mammary epithelial cells in vivo and in vitro Naoko Nukumi, Kayoko Ikeda, Megumi Osawa, Tokuko Iwamori, Kunihiko Naito, Hideaki Tojo* Laboratory of Applied Genetics, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8657, Japan Received for publication 14 October 2003, revised 30 March 2004, accepted 28 April 2004 Available online 10 August 2004 Abstract Although possible biological functions of whey acidic protein (WAP) have been suggested, few studies have focused on investigating the function of WAP. This paper describes evidence for WAP function in lobulo-alveolar development in mammary glands in vivo and in the cell cycle progression of mammary epithelial cells in vitro. Ubiquitous overexpression of WAP transgene impaired only lobulo-alveolar development in the mammary glands of transgenic female mice but not other physiological functions, indicating that the inhibitory function of WAP is specific to mammary alveolar cells. The forced expression of WAP significantly inhibited the proliferation of mouse mammary epithelial cells (HC11 cells and EpH4/K6 cells), whereas it did not affect that of NIH3T3 cells. Co-culturing of WAP-clonal cells and control cells using a transwell insert demonstrated that WAP inhibited the proliferation of HC11 cells through a paracrine action but not that of NIH3T3 cells, and that WAP was able to bind to HC11 cells but not to NIH3T3 cells. Apoptosis was not enhanced in the HC11 cells with stable WAP expression (WAP-clonal HC11 cells). BrdU incorporation and FACScan analyses revealed that cell cycle progression from the G0/G1 to the S phase was inhibited in the WAP-clonal HC11 cells. Among G1 cyclins, the expression of cyclin D1 and D3 was significantly decreased in the WAP-clonal HC11 cells. The present results provide the first documented evidence that WAP plays a negative regulatory role in the cell cycle progression of mammary epithelial cells through an autocrine or paracrine mechanism in vivo. D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Cell cycle; Cell proliferation; FACScan; HC11 cells; Mammary; Epithelial cells; Transgenic mice; WAP Introduction al., 2001).WAPgeneexpressionoccursinmammary epithelial cells during late pregnancy and throughout Whey acidic protein (WAP) has been found in the milk of lactation, and is regulated by a variety of lactogenic a limited number of species of rodents, including mice hormones, including insulin, glucocorticoid, and prolactin (Hennighausen and Sippel, 1982a) and rats (Campbell et al., (Burdon et al., 1991a; Doppler et al., 1991; Vonderhaar and 1984). In addition, WAP has been identified in camels (Beg Ziska, 1989). WAP proteins have a signal peptide (Dandekar et al., 1984) and rabbits (Devinoy et al., 1988), and more et al., 1982) and two domain structures that can be identified recently in the milk of pigs (Rival et al., 2001; Simpson et al., at the four-disulfide core (4-DSC) domain, which is 1998), wallabies (Simpson et al., 2000), red kangaroos composed of eight cysteine residues in a conserved arrange- (Nicholas et al., 2001), and brush tail possums (Demmer et ment (Hennighausen and Sippel, 1982b). The 4-DSC domain arrangement is not exclusive to the WAP family; several other proteins containing 4-DSC domains have been * Corresponding author. Laboratory of Applied Genetics, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo, 1-1-1 identified (Dandekar et al., 1982; Garczynski and Goetz, Yayoi, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8657, Japan. Fax: +81 3 5841 8191. 1997; Heinzel et al., 1986; Kirchhoff et al., 1991; Wideow et E-mail address: [email protected] (H. Tojo). al., 1990), which contain either single or multiple copies of 0012-1606/$ - see front matter D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ydbio.2004.04.040 32 N. Nukumi et al. / Developmental Biology 274 (2004) 31–44 the 4-DSC domain. Generally, these proteins are secreted A 452-bp segment of the WAP cDNA was inserted into a and may function as protease inhibitors (Larsen et al., 1998; pGEM-T Easy vector (Promega) and amplified. We deter- Ranganathan et al., 2000). Thus, based on the limited mined the DNA sequences of the PCR products and judged sequence identity with known protease inhibitors, it has been the results to indicate a complete cDNA encoding of the full postulated that WAP may also be a secreting protease open reading frame of mouse WAP. EGFP in pCX-EGFP inhibitor (Nicholas et al., 1997; Ranganathan et al., 2000). plasmid (kindly provided by Dr. M. Okabe, Osaka University, However, previous studies have demonstrated that rat WAP Japan) was excised, and in turn replaced by the EcoRI/EcoRI does not exhibit any protease inhibitory activity in elastase I WAP cDNA fragment (452 bp). The pCX-WAP plasmid and II and chymotrypsin assays (Burdon et al., 1991b). contained an enhancer of cytomegalo virus, a chicken h-actin Transgenic mothers in which a mouse genomic WAP promoter with splicing sequences, WAP cDNA, and the transgene is expressed precociously have significantly rabbit h-globin 3V flanking sequences. For the production of impaired development of the mammary gland and have transgenic mice, the SspI/HindIII DNA fragment (2.98 kb) failed to lactate (Burdon et al., 1991b; Shamay et al., 1992). was excised from a pCXN-WAP and separated by electro- It has also been reported that high expression of WAP in phoresis using a 1% agarose gel, and then purified by CsCl MMTV-LTR/WAP transgenic mice results in hyperplasia of ultracentrifugation according to the method of Hogan et al. coagulation glands and impaired mammary development (1994). For the transfection of plasmids into cultured cells, (Hennighausen et al., 1994). On the other hand, Guntzberg et pCXN-WAP plasmid, pCXN-EGFP plasmid as a marker al. (1991) and Wen et al. (1995) have reported, based on their gene, and pCXN plasmid without the coding region as an RT-PCR analyses, that WAP is expressed in various exocrine empty plasmid (mock) were used, respectively. tissues of lactating mice. Such findings suggest that WAP is important as a nutrient in milk for growth, but that it also may CAG/WAP transgenic mice exert some other biological function not only in the mammary gland but also in other tissues. To date, few The purified DNA fragment (approximately 2000 copies) studies have investigated the true function of WAP. To was microinjected using standard methodology into the determine whether WAP functions in any tissue types other pronucleus of BDF1 (C57BL/6XDBA/2) eggs (Hogan et al., than the mammary glands, we generated transgenic mice 1994). The pups were screened for the transgene by PCR ubiquitously expressing WAP and investigated their pheno- and Southern blot analysis of genomic DNA obtained from types. WAP function was also investigated by an in vitro the tip of the tail. The primers 5V-ATG-CGT-TGC-CTC- system using mammary epithelial cells (HC11 cells). Here, ATC-AGC-C-3V (forward) and 5V-GAC-AGG-CAG-GGA- we report that the ubiquitous and forced production of WAP TGG-C-3V (reverse) were used for the detection of WAP not only inhibits lobulo-alveolar development in vivo but cDNA by PCR, and WAP cDNA labeled with 32P a-dCTP also the cell cycle progression of HC11 cells in vitro. was used as a probe for Southern blot analysis. Whole mounts of mammary glands Materials and methods The third thoracic mammary glands were removed from Animals the transgenic and control mice. Each mammary gland was dissected from the inner surface of the skin, retaining some Mice were purchased from a laboratory animal dealer of the peripheral connective tissues, spread on a cork board, (SLC, Shizuoka, Japan) and were housed under regulated and fixed in freshly prepared Bouin’s solution. The glands temperature (22–258C), humidity (40–60%), and illumina- were then defatted overnight in acetone. The whole mounts tion cycles (14-h light, 10-h dark); food and water were were stained with Mayer’s hematoxylin, embedded in supplied ad libitum. The experiments were conducted Canadian balsam, and photographed. according to the Guidelines for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals from the University of Tokyo College Histological examination of mammary glands of Agriculture. Tissues were embedded in optimal cutting temperature Gene construction compound (Sakura Finetechnical) and frozen in liquid nitrogen. Frozen sections, 5-Am thick, were mounted on Mouse WAP cDNA was made by reverse transcription vectabond-coated slides and fixed in 3% paraformaldehyde using total RNAs that were extracted from the mammary in PBS (pH 7.4) for 15 min at room temperature. The glands of C57BL/6J female mice in late pregnancy using sections were then blocked with 0.3% H2O2 in methanol for Trizol Reagent (Gibson BRL) according to the manufactur- 30 min at room temperature and then 8% skim milk at 48C er’s instructions. PCR was carried out using the following overnight. After washing with PBS (pH 7.4), the sections primers: 5V-ATG-CGT-TGC-CTC-ATC-AGC-C-3V (for- were incubated with primary antibodies, anti-WAP rabbit ward) and 5V-GAC-AGG-CAG-GGA-TGG-C-3V (reverse). serum in a 1/100 dilution with 1% BSA in PBS for 1 h. The N. Nukumi et al. / Developmental Biology 274 (2004) 31–44 33 sections were rinsed in PBS (pH 7.4) and then incubated for Cell culture 40 min with the biotin-labeled mouse anti-rabbit secondary antibody (B5283) (Sigma) in a 1/400 dilution. Signals were Two independent mammary epithelial cell lines derived detected by the horseradish-peroxidase-labeled avidin–bio- from mouse pregnant mammary glands were used: HC11 tin complex (ABC)-mediated method (Vector Laboratories) cells (kindly provided by Dr.