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Role of the histone deacetylase complex in acute promyelocytic leukaemia

Nature volume 391, pages 811–814 (1998)Cite this article

Abstract

Non-liganded retinoic acid receptors (RARs) repress transcription of target genes by recruiting the histone deacetylase complex1,2,3 through a class of silencing mediators termed SMRT or N-CoR4,5. Mutant forms of RARα, created by chromosomal translocations with either the PML (for promyelocytic leukaemia)6,7,8 or the PLZF (for promyelocytic leukaemia zinc finger)9,10 locus, are oncogenic and result in human acute promyelocytic leukaemia (APL). PML–RARα APL patients achieve complete remission following treatments with pharmacological doses of retinoic acids (RA); in contrast, PLZF–RARα patients respond very poorly, if at all11. Here we report that the association of these two chimaeric receptors with the histone deacetylase (HDAC) complex helps to determine both the development of APL and the ability of patients to respond to retinoids. Consistent with these observations, inhibitors of histone deacetylase dramatically potentiate retinoid-induced differentiation of RA-sensitive, and restore retinoid responses of RA-resistant, APL cell lines. Our findings suggest that oncogenic RARs mediate leukaemogenesis through aberrant chromatin acetylation, and that pharmacological manipulation of nuclear receptor co-factors may be a useful approach in the treatment of human disease.

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Figure 1: Association of co-repressors and HDAC1 with PLZF.
Figure 2: Association of co-repressors and histone deacetylases with PLZF–RARα and PML–RARα.
Figure 3: Impaired ligand-dependent dissociation of co-repressors from PLZF–RARα and PML–RARα proteins.
Figure 4: Histone deacetylase inhibitors suppress oncogenic activities of PLZF–RARα and PML–RARα.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Z. Chen, S.-J. Chen and S. Schreiber for critical reagents; P. Dhordain for suggestions and comments; H. Y. Kao, J. Schwabe and H. Chen for constructs and reagents; H. Juguilon and J. Alvarez for technical assistance; L. Ong and E. Stevens for administrative assistance; and members of the Evans laboratory for critical reading of the manuscript. R.J.L. is a predoctoral fellow of the Lucille P. Markey Charitable Trust. S.I. acknowledges support from the Uehara Memorial Foundation and the TOYOBO Foundation. R.M.E. is an investigator and L.N. is a research associate of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the Salk Institute. W.H.M. is a scholar of the Medical Research Council of Canada. This work was supported by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the NIH.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Howard Hughes Medical Institute, La Jolla, 92037, California, USA

    Richard J. Lin, Laszlo Nagy & Ronald M. Evans

  2. The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, 92037, California, USA

    Richard J. Lin, Laszlo Nagy, Satoshi Inoue & Ronald M. Evans

  3. Graduate Program in Molecular Pathology, University of California San Diego, School of Medicine, La Jolla, 92093, California, USA

    Richard J. Lin

  4. McGill University Departments of Oncology and Medicine, Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research, Montreal, H3T 1E2, Quebec, Canada

    Wenlin Shao & Wilson H. Miller Jr

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Correspondence to Ronald M. Evans.

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Lin, R., Nagy, L., Inoue, S. et al. Role of the histone deacetylase complex in acute promyelocytic leukaemia. Nature 391, 811–814 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1038/35895

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