Nucleotide excision repair protein levels vis-à-vis anticancer drug resistance in 60 human tumor cell lines.

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE: Nucleotide excision repair (NER) is a multi-enzyme DNA repair system in eukaryotes. Several NER genes in this system including XPA, XPB, ERCC1, and ERCC2 (XPD) have been implicated in anticancer drug resistance in human tumor cells. This study was designed to investigate the relationship between the expression of NER protein and the drug-resistance of human tumor cell lines. METHODS: In this study, The authors assessed the levels of the above mentioned proteins, by utilizing Western blot analysis, in the USA National Cancer Institute (NCI) panel of 60 human tumor cell lines and correlated to the cytotoxicity patterns of 170 compounds that constitute the standard agent (SA) database. RESULTS: The ERCC1, XPB, and XPD protein expression patterns yielded significant negative Pearson correlations with 13, 17, and 32 out of the 170 compounds, respectively (P < 0.05). XPA produced a random assortment of negative and positive correlations and did not appear to confer an overall resistance or sensitivity to these drugs. Protein expression was also compared with a pre-defined categorisation of the standard agents into six mechanism-of-action (MOA) groups resulting in an inverse association between XPD and alkylating agent sensitivity. CONCLUSION: Our present data demonstrate that XPD protein levels correlate with resistance to alkylating agents in human tumor cell lines, suggesting that XPD plays an important role in the development of this resistance.

Regulation of cisplatin resistance and homologous recombinational repair by the TFIIH subunit XPD.

We have recently completed screening of the National Cancer Institute human tumor cell line panel and demonstrated that among four nucleotide excision repair proteins (XPA, XPB, XPD, and ERCC1), only the TFIIH subunit XPD endogenous protein levels correlate with alkylating agent drug resistance. In the present study, we extended this work by investigating the biological consequences of XPD overexpression in the human glioma cell line SK-MG-4. Our results indicate that XPD overexpression in SK-MG-4 cells leads to cisplatin resistance without affecting the nucleotide excision repair activity or UV light sensitivity of the cell. In contrast, in SK-MG-4 cells treated with cisplatin, XPD overexpression leads to increased Rad51-related homologous recombinational repair, increased sister chromatid exchanges, and accelerated interstrand cross-link removal. Moreover, we present biochemical evidence of an XPD-Rad51 protein interaction, which is modulated by DNA damage. To our knowledge, this is the first description of functional cross-talk between XPD and Rad51, which leads to bifunctional alkylating agent drug resistance and accelerated removal of interstrand cross-links.

DNA repair protein levels vis-à-vis anticancer drug resistance in the human tumor cell lines of the National Cancer Institute drug screening program.

Nucleotide excision repair (NER) is a multi-enzyme DNA repair pathway in eukaryotes. Several NER genes in this pathway including XPB, XPD, XPA and ERCC-1 have been implicated in anticancer drug resistance in human tumor cells. In this study, we assessed the levels of the above-mentioned proteins in the NCI panel of 60 human tumor cell lines in relation to the cytotoxicity patterns of 170 compounds that constitute the standard agent (SA) database. The database consists of drugs used in the clinic for which a mechanism of action has been at least partially defined. The ERCC-1, XPD and XPB protein expression patterns yielded significant negative Pearson correlations with 13, 32 and 17 out of the 170 compounds, respectively (using p<0.05). XPA produced a random assortment of negative and positive correlations, and did not appear to confer an overall resistance or sensitivity to these drugs. Protein expression was also compared with a pre-defined categorization of the standard agents into six mechanism-of-action groups resulting in an inverse association between XPD and alkylating agent sensitivity. Our present data demonstrate that XPD protein levels correlate with resistance to alkylating agents in human tumor cell lines suggesting that XPD is implicated in the development of this resistance. NER activity, using the in vitro cell-free system repair assay, revealed no correlation between NER activity and the level of XPD protein in four cell lines with widely varying XPD protein levels. This lack of correlation may be due to the contribution of XPD to other functions including interactions with the Rad51 repair pathway.