Attenuation of hedgehog acyltransferase-catalyzed sonic Hedgehog palmitoylation causes reduced signaling, proliferation and invasiveness of human carcinoma cells

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

  • Antonios D Konitsiotis
  • Shu-Chun Chang
  • Biljana Jovanović
  • Paulina Ciepla
  • Naoko Masumoto
  • Christopher P Palmer
  • Edward W Tate
  • Couchman, John Robert
  • Anthony I Magee
Overexpression of Hedgehog family proteins contributes to the aetiology of many cancers. To be highly active, Hedgehog proteins must be palmitoylated at their N-terminus by the MBOAT family multispanning membrane enzyme Hedgehog acyltransferase (Hhat). In a pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cell line PANC-1 and transfected HEK293a cells Hhat localized to the endoplasmic reticulum. siRNA knockdown showed that Hhat is required for Sonic hedgehog (Shh) palmitoylation, for its assembly into high molecular weight extracellular complexes and for functional activity. Hhat knockdown inhibited Hh autocrine and juxtacrine signaling, and inhibited PDAC cell growth and invasiveness in vitro. In addition, Hhat knockdown in a HEK293a cell line constitutively expressing Shh and A549 human non-small cell lung cancer cells inhibited their ability to signal in a juxtacrine/paracrine fashion to the reporter cell lines C3H10T1/2 and Shh-Light2. Our data identify Hhat as a key player in Hh-dependent signaling and tumour cell transformed behaviour.
Original languageEnglish
Article numbere89899
JournalPloS one
Volume9
Issue number3
Pages (from-to)1-13
Number of pages13
ISSN1932-6203
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2014

ID: 109872694