Biology subjects

Sebti, S.

Publications and source records attributed to Sebti, S..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2022

CDKL5 regulates p62-mediated selective autophagy and host antiviral defense

Virophagy, the selective autophagosomal engulfment and degradation of viral components, is crucial for antiviral immunity. However, the mechanisms leading to viral antigen recognition and autophagy induction remain poorly understood. Here, we identify a novel kinase, Cyclin-dependent kinase-like 5 (CDKL5), as an essential regulator of virophagy. Deletion of CDKL5 or abrogation of its kinase activity reduced virophagy of Sindbis virus (SINV), a neurotropic RNA virus, and increased intracellular accumulation of SINV capsid proteins and cellular cytotoxicity. Mechanistically, through direct phosphorylation of the selective autophagy receptor p62, CDKL5 promoted formation of p62 inclusion bodies that bound capsid. Loss of CDKL5 disrupted the capsid-p62 interaction, and a p62 phosphomimetic mutant rescued the interaction. CDKL5 knockout mice demonstrated increased neuronal cell death after SINV infection and enhanced lethality after infection with several human viruses. Overall, these findings identify a cell-autonomous innate immune mechanism for autophagy activation to clear toxic viral capsid aggregates during infection.

microbiology↗

bioRxiv2022

Heme overdrive rewires pan-cancer cell metabolism

Porphyrin overdrive rewires pan-cancer cell metabolismAll cancer cells reprogram metabolism to support aberrant growth. Here, we report that cancer cells employ and depend on imbalanced and dynamic heme metabolic pathways for their oncogenic growth. We coined this essential metabolic rewiring porphyrin overdrive and determined that it is cancer-universal, cancer-essential, and cancer-specific. While porphyrin overdrive is absent in differentiated cells or somatic stem cells, it is present in patient-derived tumor progenitor cells, demonstrated by single cell RNAseq, and in early embryogenesis. Among the major drivers are proteins involved in biosynthesis of heme intermediates and heme trafficking. CRISPR/Cas9 editing to engineer leukemia cells with impaired heme biosynthetic steps confirmed our whole genomic data analyses that porphyrin overdrive is linked to oncogenic states and cellular differentiation. In conclusion, we identified a dependence of cancer cells on non-homeostatic heme metabolism, and we targeted this cancer metabolic vulnerability with a novel "bait-and-kill" strategy to eradicate malignant cells. One-Sentence SummaryPorphyrin overdrive reprograms cancer cellular metabolism.

cancer biology↗

bioRxiv2022

BECN1 F121A mutation increases autophagic flux in aged mice and improves aging phenotypes in an organ-dependent manner

Autophagy is necessary for lifespan extension in multiple model organisms and autophagy dysfunction impacts age-related phenotypes and diseases. Introduction of an F121A mutation into the essential autophagy protein BECN1 constitutively increases basal autophagy in young mice and reduces cardiac and renal age-related changes in longer-lived Becn1F121A mutant mice. However, both autophagic and lysosomal activity have been described to decline with age. Thus, whether autophagic flux is maintained during aging and whether it is enhanced in Becn1F121A mice is unknown. Here we demonstrate that old wild type mice maintained functional autophagic flux in heart, kidney and skeletal muscle but not liver, and old Becn1F121A mice had increased autophagic flux in those same organs compared to wild type. In parallel, Becn1F121A mice were not protected against age-associated hepatic phenotypes but demonstrated reduced skeletal muscle fiber atrophy. These findings identify an organ-specific role for the ability of autophagy to impact organ aging phenotypes.

physiology↗