Nature of Cancer Explored from the Perspective of the Functional Evolution of Proto-oncogenes

Abstract

The products of proto-oncogene play critical roles in the development or maintenance of multicellular societies in animals via strict regulatory systems. When these regulatory systems are disrupted, proto-oncogenes can become oncogenes, and thereby induce cell transformation and carcinogenesis. To understand the molecular basis for development of the regulatory system of proto-oncogenes during evolution, we screened for ancestral proto-oncogenes from the unicellular choanoflagellate Monosiga ovata (M. ovata) by monitoring their transforming ability in mammalian cells; consequently, we isolated a Pak gene ortholog, which encodes a serine/threonine kinase as a 'primitive oncogene'. We also cloned Pak orthologs from fungi and the multicellular sponge Ephydatia fluviatilis, and compared their regulatory features with that of M. ovata Pak (MoPak). MoPak is constitutively active and induces cell transformation in mammalian cells. In contrast, Pak orthologs from multicellular animals are strictly regulated. Analyses of Pak mutants revealed that structural alterations in the auto-inhibitory domain (AID) are responsible for the enhanced kinase activity and the oncogenic activity of MoPak. Furthermore, we show that Rho family GTPases-mediated regulatory system of Pak kinase is conserved throughout the evolution from unicellular to multicellular animals, but the MoPak is more sensitive to the Rho family GTPases-mediated activation than multicellular Pak. These results show that maturation of AID function was required for the development of the strict regulatory system of the Pak proto-oncogene, and support the potential link between the development of the regulatory system of proto-oncogenes and the evolution of multicellularity. Further analysis of oncogenic functions of proto-oncogene orthologs in the unicellular genes would provide some insights into the mechanisms of the destruction of multicellular society in cancer.