Publications by authors named "Neel B"

Unlabelled: SHP1 (PTPN6) and SHP2 (PTPN11) are closely related protein-tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs), which are autoinhibited until their SH2 domains bind paired tyrosine-phosphorylated immunoreceptor tyrosine-based inhibitory/switch motifs (ITIMs/ITSMs). These PTPs bind overlapping sets of ITIM/ITSM-bearing proteins, suggesting that they might have some redundant functions. By studying T cell-specific single and double knockout mice, we found that SHP1 and SHP2 redundantly restrain naïve T cell differentiation to effector and central memory phenotypes, with SHP1 playing the dominant role.

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Malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors (MPNSTs) are aggressive sarcomas and the primary cause of mortality in patients with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1). These malignancies develop within preexisting benign lesions called plexiform neurofibromas (PNs). PNs are solely driven by biallelic loss eliciting RAS pathway activation, and they respond favorably to MEK inhibitor therapy.

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Background And Objectives: Three phase 3 trials demonstrated the efficacy and safety of atogepant in episodic migraine (EM) and chronic migraine (CM) across 12-week treatment periods. This analysis evaluates improvements in efficacy and functional outcomes in the first 4 weeks of treatment with the oral calcitonin gene-related peptide receptor antagonist, atogepant, for the preventive treatment of migraine.

Methods: ADVANCE, ELEVATE, and PROGRESS were phase 3, multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled 12-week trials.

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  • Hypoxic cancer cells often resist treatments and can lead to cancer recurrence, with PTP1B deficiency promoting breast cancer cell death under low oxygen conditions via RNF213 activation.
  • PTP1B and ABL1/2 interact to regulate RNF213 phosphorylation, promoting its role in degrading CYLD/SPATA2, which in turn activates NF-κB and the NLRP3 inflammasome, culminating in pyroptotic cell death.
  • The findings reveal a novel PTP1B-RNF213-CYLD-SPATA2 pathway that plays a critical role in inflammatory cell death in hypoxic tumors, with broader implications for diseases like Moyamoya, inflammation, and autoimmune disorders.
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The interaction between tumors and their microenvironment is complex and heterogeneous. Recent developments in high-dimensional multiplexed imaging have revealed the spatial organization of tumor tissues at the molecular level. However, the discovery and thorough characterization of the tumor microenvironment (TME) remains challenging due to the scale and complexity of the images.

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  • Atogepant is an oral medication designed to prevent chronic migraines and was tested in a study involving participants with and without medication overuse.
  • The study involved 755 adults and assessed the impact of two dosages of atogepant compared to a placebo over 12 weeks, measuring changes in headache and migraine days.
  • Results showed significant reductions in migraine and headache days, along with reduced medication use, particularly in participants treated with atogepant, highlighting its effectiveness in managing chronic migraines.
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The HapImmune platform exploits covalent inhibitors as haptens for creating major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-presented tumor-specific neoantigens by design, combining targeted therapies with immunotherapy for the treatment of drug-resistant cancers. A HapImmune antibody, R023, recognizes multiple sotorasib-conjugated KRAS(G12C) peptides presented by different human leukocyte antigens (HLAs). This high specificity to sotorasib, coupled with broad HLA-binding capability, enables such antibodies, when reformatted as T cell engagers, to potently and selectively kill sotorasib-resistant KRAS(G12C) cancer cells expressing different HLAs upon sotorasib treatment.

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Glycolysis is a fundamental cellular process, yet its regulatory mechanisms remain incompletely understood. Here, we show that a subset of glucose transporter 1 (GLUT1/SLC2A1) co-endocytoses with platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) receptor (PDGFR) upon PDGF-stimulation. Furthermore, multiple glycolytic enzymes localize to these endocytosed PDGFR/GLUT1-containing vesicles adjacent to mitochondria.

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  • KRAS inhibitors like adagrasib and sotorasib can help treat lung cancers with KRAS mutations, but many patients still develop resistance over time.
  • In patients with a specific type of lung cancer (adenocarcinoma) that also has STK11/LKB1 mutations, certain gene patterns can predict a poorer response to treatment.
  • Research shows that these cancers can change their type to avoid being affected by the drugs, and scientists found specific markers that indicate how likely someone is to respond to KRAS treatment.
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Approximately 30% of early-stage lung adenocarcinoma patients present with disease progression after successful surgical resection. Despite efforts of mapping the genetic landscape, there has been limited success in discovering predictive biomarkers of disease outcomes. Here we performed a systematic multi-omic assessment of 143 tumors and matched tumor-adjacent, histologically-normal lung tissue with long-term patient follow-up.

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Hypoxic cancer cells resist many anti-neoplastic therapies and can seed recurrence. We found previously that PTP1B deficiency promotes HER2+ breast cancer cell death in hypoxia by activating RNF213, an ∼600kDa protein containing AAA-ATPase domains and two ubiquitin ligase domains (RING and RZ) that also is implicated in Moyamoya disease (MMD), lipotoxicity, and innate immunity. Here we report that PTP1B and ABL1/2 reciprocally control RNF213 phosphorylation on tyrosine-1275.

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  • * Researchers used CRISPR/Cas9 screens to find genes whose deletion could enhance the effectiveness of a KRASG12C inhibitor (adagrasib) and a combination treatment, identifying several potentially targetable synthetic lethal genes linked to specific biological pathways.
  • * These findings suggest potential new targets for combination therapies that could improve treatment outcomes for patients, especially for those whose tumors have developed resistance to existing treatments.
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Glycolysis is a fundamental cellular process, yet its regulatory mechanisms remain incompletely understood. Here, we show that a subset of glucose transporter 1 (GLUT1/SLC2A1) co-endocytoses with platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) receptor (PDGFR) upon PDGF-stimulation. Furthermore, multiple glycolytic enzymes localize to these endocytosed PDGFR/GLUT1-containing vesicles adjacent to mitochondria.

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Treatment and relevant targets for breast cancer (BC) remain limited, especially for triple-negative BC (TNBC). We identified 6091 proteins of 76 human BC cell lines using data-independent acquisition (DIA). Integrating our proteomic findings with prior multi-omics datasets, we found that including proteomics data improved drug sensitivity predictions and provided insights into the mechanisms of action.

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  • LKB1/STK11 is a key serine/threonine kinase involved in cell metabolism, with implications for treating cancers that have LKB1 mutations.
  • Research identified CD38, an NAD-degrading enzyme, as a new therapeutic target specifically in LKB1-mutant non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
  • The study showed that targeting CD38 with the anti-CD38 antibody daratumumab effectively inhibited tumor growth in mouse models, highlighting its potential in treating LKB1-mutant lung cancers.
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TET2 haploinsufficiency is a driving event in myeloid cancers and is associated with a worse prognosis in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Enhancing residual TET2 activity using vitamin C increases oxidized 5-methylcytosine (mC) formation and promotes active DNA demethylation via base excision repair (BER), which slows leukemia progression. We utilize genetic and compound library screening approaches to identify rational combination treatment strategies to improve use of vitamin C as an adjuvant therapy for AML.

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  • SHP2 plays a key role in activating RAS and is targeted by allosteric SHP2 inhibitors (SHP2i) for treating certain cancers, making these inhibitors effective against RTK- or RAS-driven tumor growth.
  • Researchers used CRISPR/Cas9 screens to identify genes that contribute to resistance against SHP2 inhibitors, discovering known and novel targets involved in this resistance.
  • Deletions of genes like LZTR1, MAP4K5, and INPPL1 were linked to SHP2i resistance, affecting ERK signaling and suggesting that understanding this resistance could lead to better combination therapies.
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Unlabelled: Intracellular oncoproteins can be inhibited with targeted therapy, but responses are not durable. Immune therapies can be curative, but most oncogene-driven tumors are unresponsive to these agents. Fragments of intracellular oncoproteins can act as neoantigens presented by the major histocompatibility complex (MHC), but recognizing minimal differences between oncoproteins and their normal counterparts is challenging.

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Despite being the most frequently altered oncogenic protein in solid tumours, KRAS has historically been considered 'undruggable' owing to a lack of pharmacologically targetable pockets within the mutant isoforms. However, improvements in drug design have culminated in the development of inhibitors that are selective for mutant KRAS in its active or inactive state. Some of these inhibitors have proven efficacy in patients with KRAS-mutant cancers and have become practice changing.

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Cadherins are a superfamily of adhesion proteins involved in a variety of biological processes that include the formation of intercellular contacts, the maintenance of tissue integrity, and the development of neuronal circuits. These transmembrane proteins are characterized by ectodomains composed of a variable number of extracellular cadherin (EC) repeats that are similar but not identical in sequence and fold. E-cadherin, along with desmoglein and desmocollin proteins, are three classical-type cadherins that have slightly curved ectodomains and engage in homophilic and heterophilic interactions through an exchange of conserved tryptophan residues in their N-terminal EC1 repeat.

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Cadherin-based adherens junctions and desmosomes help stabilize cell-cell contacts with additional function in mechano-signaling, while clustered protocadherin junctions are responsible for directing neuronal circuits assembly. Structural models for adherens junctions formed by epithelial cadherin (CDH1) proteins indicate that their long, curved ectodomains arrange to form a periodic, two-dimensional lattice stabilized by tip-to-tip trans interactions (across junction) and lateral cis contacts. Less is known about the exact architecture of desmosomes, but desmoglein (DSG) and desmocollin (DSC) cadherin proteins are also thought to form ordered junctions.

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Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in , which encodes a 591-kD protein with AAA+ ATPase and RING E3 domains, are associated with a rare, autosomal dominant cerebrovascular disorder, moyamoya disease (MMD). MMD-associated SNPs primarily localize to the C-terminal region of , and some affect conserved residues in the RING domain. Although the autosomal dominant inheritance of MMD could most easily explained by RNF213 gain-of-function, the type of ubiquitylation catalyzed by RNF213 and the effects of MMD-associated SNPs on its E3 ligase activity have remained unclear.

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Unlabelled: Resistance to targeted therapies is an important clinical problem in HER2-positive (HER2+) breast cancer. "Drug-tolerant persisters" (DTP), a subpopulation of cancer cells that survive via reversible, nongenetic mechanisms, are implicated in resistance to tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI) in other malignancies, but DTPs following HER2 TKI exposure have not been well characterized. We found that HER2 TKIs evoke DTPs with a luminal-like or a mesenchymal-like transcriptome.

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Protein tyrosine phosphatases constitute a family of cytosolic and receptor-like signal transducing enzymes that catalyze the hydrolysis of phospho-tyrosine residues of phosphorylated proteins. PTP1B, encoded by , is a key negative regulator of insulin and leptin receptor signaling, linking it to two widespread diseases: type 2 diabetes mellitus and obesity. Here, we present crystal structures of the PTP1B apo-enzyme and a complex with a newly identified allosteric inhibitor, 2-(2,5-dimethyl-pyrrol-1-yl)-5-hydroxy-benzoic acid, designated as P00058.

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