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Background/Objectives: The Germ Cell Theory of cancer posits that human primordial germ cells (hPGCs) are the cells of origin for malignancies. While this theory is well established for germ cell cancers, a germ cell origin for somatic cancers has been largely overlooked despite clinical observations of malignant somatic transformation (MST), wherein germ cell cancers give rise to diverse somatic cancer phenotypes, often without additional mutations. Methods: To test the Germ Cell Theory experimentally in somatic cancer, we established a virus-driven MST model linking hPGC-like cells (hPGCLCs) to Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV)-positive Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC), a highly aggressive somatic cancer with a germ cell cancer-like, low-mutation epigenetic profile. The MCPyV genome was transduced into human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) or hPGC-like cells by lentiviral transfection, followed by xenotransplantation. Results: Virus-positive MCC (VP-MCC)-like tumors were consistently induced without additional oncogenic mutations. These tumors recapitulated VP-MCC’s high-grade neuroendocrine carcinoma histology and molecular profiles. DNA methylation analysis revealed near-complete global hypomethylation in VP-MCC-like tumors, matching the unique epigenetic state of late-stage hPGCs. Notably, pluripotent intermediates were neither necessary nor sufficient for MST; transformation required acquisition of a late-hPGC-like epigenetic state. Conclusions: This is the first MST model of a somatic cancer arising through an aberrant germline-to-soma transition. Our findings unify VP-MCC and germ cell cancer biology, challenge mutation- and soma-centric paradigms, and provide a tractable platform to investigate developmental and epigenetic mechanisms of oncogenesis. This MST model supports a unifying germ cell origin for both germ cell and non-germ cell somatic malignancies.

NSC243928 induces cell death in triple-negative breast cancer cells in a LY6K-dependent manner. NSC243928 has been reported as an anti-cancer agent in the NCI small molecule library. The molecular mechanism of NSC243928 as an anti-cancer agent in the treatment of tumor growth in the syngeneic mouse model has not been established. With the success of immunotherapies, novel anti-cancer drugs that may elicit an anti-tumor immune response are of high interest in the development of novel drugs to treat solid cancer. Thus, we focused on studying whether NSC243928 may elicit an anti-tumor immune response in the in vivo mammary tumor models of 4T1 and E0771. We observed that NSC243928 induced immunogenic cell death in 4T1 and E0771 cells. Furthermore, NSC243928 mounted an anti-tumor immune response by increasing immune cells such as patrolling monocytes, NKT cells, B1 cells, and decreasing PMN MDSCs in vivo. Further studies are required to understand the exact mechanism of NSC243928 action in inducing an anti-tumor immune response in vivo, which can be used to determine a molecular signature associated with NSC243928 efficacy. NSC243928 may be a good target for future immuno-oncology drug development for breast cancer.

The Germ Cell Theory, rooted in developmental biology, has significantly advanced both the understanding and curative treatment of rare germ cell cancers (GCCs). In contrast, somatic cancer research - long dominated by the Somatic Mutation Theory - has stagnated due to fragmented, mutation-centric approaches that lack a unifying conceptual framework and have yielded only limited clinical progress. GCC research identifies non-somatic human primordial germ cells (hPGCs) as the cells of origin for GCCs. In somatic cancers, although the cancer stem cell theory is gaining acceptance, cancer stem cells are assumed to be of somatic origin, with their exact identity undefined. Accumulating experimental evidence and clinical observations challenge the traditional separation between GCCs and somatic cancers, including malignant somatic transformation (MST) - the emergence of somatic cancer phenotypes from GCCs, often without new mutations - suggesting that hPGCs may also initiate somatic cancers. However, no experimental model of MST has been established. Merkel cell polyomavirus-positive Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC), a highly aggressive somatic cancer with paradoxically stable genomes resembling those of GCCs, offers a unique model to test germ cell theory-based somatic oncogenesis. Here we present an MST mouse model linking hPGC origin to somatic cancer by inducing virus-positive MCC-like tumors in vivo from virus-transfected hPGC-like cells or human iPSCs competent for hPGC specification with an obligatory late-hPGC state preceding MST. This genetically simple, molecularly tractable model provides a novel platform to dissect VP-MCC pathogenesis and broadly advocates a developmental biology framework for somatic cancer research beyond mutation-centric and soma-centric paradigms.

Interferon regulatory factor (IRF)–1 expression was surveyed in nontransformed and oncogene‐transformed mouse fibroblasts, using Western immunoblot with an IRF‐1–specific antiserum, to examine possible differences resulting from cellular transformation. Ten additional proteins that reacted with the IRF‐1 antibody and that underwent specific competition by peptide antigen were observed in extracts of both nontransformed and oncogene‐transformed cell lines. Cross‐reacting proteins were also observed in mouse macrophage extracts. Protein was captured from fibroblast nuclear extracts, using oligonucleotides representing IRF‐binding sequences linked to magnetic beads. Captured proteins were eluted and analyzed by immunoblot with anti–IRF‐1. Along with 43‐kDa IRF‐1, 4 of the 7 nuclearly located cross‐reacting proteins (97, 90, 66, and 33 kDa) were found to complex with the IRF binding element. These proteins, with an epitope in common with the IRF‐1 C‐terminal region and IRF element DNA sequence–binding capability, may represent new members of the IRF family.

A partial complementary DNA was isolated for a gene (rrg) that is normally expressed in mouse NIH 3T3 cells, but is down-regulated after cellular transformation by long terminal repeat (LTR)-activated c-H-ras (LTR-c-H-ras). This gene was reexpressed in a nontumorigenic persistent revertant cell line created by prolonged treatment of the transformed cells with mouse interferon α/β. Persistent revertants stably transfected with rrg complementary DNA antisense expression vectors appeared transformed, had decreased amounts of rrg messenger RNA, and were tumorigenic in nude mice. Stable transfection with sense constructs did not alter the normal morphology, message level, or nontumorigenicity of the persistent revertant cell line.

Lysyl oxidase is an extracellular enzyme involved in connective tissue maturation that also acts as a phenotypic suppressor of the ras oncogene. To understand how this suppressor is controlled, gene transcription was studied and the promoter was characterized. Nuclear runoff transcription assays indicated that the markedly reduced amounts of lysyl oxidase message detected after ras transformation resulted from inhibition of lysyl oxidase transcription. Interferon-mediated phenotypic reversion of ras transformed cells, in which the ras oncogene continued to be expressed, was accompanied by the restoration of lysyl oxidase transcription. Reporter gene assay of a transfected mouse lysyl oxidase promoter indicated that it was active in the transformed background, despite the silencing of the endogenous lysyl oxidase promoter. The detection of comparable amounts of mRNA for transcription factors IRF-1 and IRF-2 in normal and ras-transformed cell lines suggests that the differential transcription of lysyl oxidase was not due to regulation of IRFs. Lysyl oxidase promoter activity was localized to a 126 bp region that includes two consensus TATA boxes with associated confirmed cap signals. Analysis of a human lysyl oxidase promoter sequence indicated similar promoter elements and extensive sequence identity with the mouse promoter. The binding of transcription factor AP2 to sites predicted in the control region was confirmed by DNase footprinting. Lysyl oxidase transcription was stimulated by dexamethasone treatment of cells, but this effect could not be assigned within the approximately 3 kb region tested in reporter gene constructs. The promoter activity of the lysyl oxidase reporter gene construct was completely abolished by in vitro DNA methylation, suggesting that the transcriptional suppression after transformation by the ras oncogene may involve DNA methylation.

Interferon (IFN) regulatory factor-1 (IRF-1) deregulation in ras-transformed mouse fibroblasts (RS485) was studied. Treatment with the proteasome inhibitor MG132 did not alter the constitutive IRF-1 protein levels in RS485 but significantly increased them in nontransformed NIH 3T3 cells at 4 h after serum stimulation of synchronized cultures. Because IRF-1 protein levels in NIH 3T3 are minimal at 4 h after serum starvation, the cyclic expression of IRF-1 in NIH 3T3 appears to be partially due to proteasome activity; however, proteasome activity in RS485 did not appear to be defective. In NIH 3T3 and RS485 cells treated with cycloheximide, there were similar rapid drops in IRF-1 protein levels, and the addition of MG132 along with cycloheximide prevented protein loss in both cell lines. Northern blot analyses of synchronized cultures showed that the IRF-1 message closely mirrored the protein expression pattern in both NIH 3T3 and RS485 cells. In synchronized cells treated with the transcription inhibitor actinomycin D, IRF-1 mRNA half-life was only marginally longer in ras-transformed fibroblasts than in the nontransformed cells, and this difference would contribute minimally to protein overexpression. These findings indicate that IRF-1 deregulation in RS485 cells occurs primarily at the transcriptional level.

Interferon (IFN) regulatory factor-1 (IRF-1) is a transcription factor that has been historically associated with type I IFN activation and antioncogenic properties. We studied IRF-1 expression and DNA-binding capacity in nontransformed and transformed mouse fibroblasts. A 43-kDa nuclear IRF-1 protein was expressed biphasically during the cell cycle in primary mouse embryo fibroblasts, nontransformed NIH 3T3 cells, and ras revertants. IRF-1 expression became constitutive in ras-transformed NIH 3T3 cells and in cells transformed by oncogenes ets, fes, fos, her-2/neu,met, mos, raf, or trk, suggesting that deregulated IRF-1 expression may be associated with loss of growth control. Lysyl oxidase (LO), a ras suppressor that is downregulated in ras transformants, is an IRF-1 target gene, but it is not stimulated by abundant IRF-1 present in transformants, while another IRF-1 target gene (iNOS) is transcribed. IRF-1 from either normal or ras-transformed cells bound to IRF elements in the IFN-β and LO promoters. IRF-1 in transformants can, therefore, bind to but not transactivate the LO promoter, and the presence of IRF-1 is not sufficient to suppress ras transformation. LO expression may effect the regulated expression of IRF-1: a ras revertant, which was generated by stable transfection of LO cDNA, regained the normal biphasic IRF-1 pattern. A mainly cytoplasmic, constitutively expressed 46-kDa protein with immunologic identity to the 43-kDa nuclear IRF-1 was also present in normal and transformed cells, but as it did not bind to the IRF elements, its function is unclear.

For more than 20 years after the excitement engendered by their discovery in 1957 as antiviral agents, there were no significant clinical uses of interferons; however, following their cloning they have been employed as effective treatment for several viral, autoimmune, and neoplastic diseases.