Abstract
Cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) are short peptides that are able to efficiently penetrate cellular lipid bilayers. Although CPPs have been used as carriers in conjugation with certain cargos to target specific genes and pathways, how rationally designed CPPs per se affect global gene expression has not been investigated. Therefore, following time course treatments with 4 CPPs-penetratin, PepFect14, mtCPP1 and TP10, HeLa cells were transcriptionally profiled by RNA sequencing. Results from these analyses showed a time-dependent response to different CPPs, with specific sets of genes related to ribosome biogenesis, microtubule dynamics and long-noncoding RNAs being differentially expressed compared to untreated controls. By using an image-based high content phenotypic profiling platform we confirmed that differential gene expression in CPP-treated HeLa cells strongly correlates with changes in cellular phenotypes such as increased nucleolar size and dispersed microtubules, compatible with altered ribosome biogenesis and cell growth. Altogether these results suggest that cells respond to different cell penetrating peptides by alteration of specific sets of genes, which are possibly part of the common response to such stimulus.
Highlights
Cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) are usually short oligopeptides consisting of 5–30 amino acids
Results from these analyses showed a time-dependent response to different CPPs, with specific sets of genes related to ribosome biogenesis, microtubule dynamics and long-noncoding RNAs being differentially expressed compared to untreated controls
Genes in two of these clusters (1 and 4) showed a strong transcriptional response after 1 h of penetratin exposure but partially reverted to their basal expression levels after 4 h. These results suggest strong initial response of cells to penetratin which fades over time as these two clusters contain the majority of differentially expressed genes
Summary
Cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) are usually short oligopeptides consisting of 5–30 amino acids. The first cell penetrating peptide was derived from the trans-activator of transcription (HIV-1 TAT) protein of the human immunodeficiency virus in 1988 [2], followed by many others in subsequent years. Further to these initial observations, a lot of efforts were placed to understand how they are internalized in cells, how they are attached to cargos and, possibly, how to achieve cell type specificity and subcellular localization needed for clinical use [3,4]. An example is provided by the acidity-triggered rational membrane (ATRAM) peptide which uses the mild acidity of tumor tissue [14] to penetrate the membranes [15]
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