CXCL1/GROα increases cell migration and invasion of prostate cancer by decreasing fibulin-1 expression through NF-κB/HDAC1 epigenetic regulation.

Inflammatory tumor microenvironments play pivotal roles in the development of cancer. Inflammatory cytokines such as CXCL1/GROα exert cancer-promoting activities by increasing tumor angiogenesis. However, whether CXCL1/GROα also plays a role in the progression of prostate cancer, particularly in highly invasive castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), has not been investigated. We explored whether CXCL1/GROα enhances cell migration and invasion in PC-3 and DU145 CRPC. Induction of PC-3 and DU145 cancer progression by CXCL1/GROα is associated with increased AKT activation and IκB kinase α (IKKα) phosphorylation, resulting in nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-κB) activation. Activated NF-κB interacts with histone deacetylase 1 (HDAC1) to form a gene-silencing complex, which represses the expression of fibulin-1D by decreasing the acetylation of histone H3 and H4 on the NF-κB-binding site of the fibulin-1D promoter. Blockade of AKT2 by small hairpin RNA (shRNA) decreases IKKα phosphorylation, NF-κB nuclear translocation and cell migration, indicating that AKT is required in CXCL1/GROα-mediated NF-κB activation and cell migration. In addition, NF-κB and HDAC1 shRNA decrease the effect of CXCL1/GROα on fibulin-1D downregulation, migration and invasion, suggesting that the NF-κB/HDAC1 complex is also involved in CXCL1/GROα-mediated cancer progression. Our findings provide the first evidence that CXCL1/GROα decreases fibulin-1D expression in prostate cancer cells and also reveals novel insights into the mechanism by which CXCL1/GROα regulates NF-κB activation through the AKT pathway. Our results also clearly establish that co-operation of NF-κB and HDAC1 regulates fibulin-1D expression by epigenetic modification. Our study suggests that inhibition of CXCL1/GROα-mediated AKT/NF-κB signaling may be an attractive therapeutic target for CRPC.