Abstract
Cellular processes like differentiation, mitotic cycle, and cell growth are regulated by tyrosine kinases with known oncogenic potential and tyrosine phosphatases that downmodulate the first. Therefore, tyrosine phosphatases are recurrent targets of gene alterations in human carcinomas. We and others suggested recently a tumor suppressor function of the
Keywords
Introduction
Deregulation of protein tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs) plays an important role in cancer development. These proteins are involved in signaling cascades that regulate a variety of cellular processes including cell growth, differentiation, and mitotic cycle. Therein, the inactivating PTPs function in a delicate balance with the activating protein tyrosine kinases. 1 Various alterations resulting in loss of function of the PTP genes observed in neoplasms emphasize their suppressive role in cancer formation. 2
Recently, we reported homozygous deletions that target the
In this study, we analyzed these putative
Materials and methods
LSCC cell lines, primary tumors, and the control samples
In total, 15 LSCC cell lines derived from patients diagnosed with LSCC at the Turku University Hospital in Finland were used (Supplementary Table S1). The cell lines were previously characterized.4,5 Cells were grown in adhesive 25 cm2 flasks in standard Dulbecco’s modified Eagle’s medium supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum at 37°C under 5% CO2 atmosphere. Cells were harvested at a confluence of 70%–90%. All cell lines were human papillomavirus (HPV) 16 and 18 negative.
Fresh frozen tumor samples were obtained from 79 patients diagnosed with LSCC who underwent surgical tumor resection followed by radiotherapy and chemotherapy in the Department of Otolaryngology and Laryngological Oncology, K. Marcinkowski University of Medical Sciences in Poznan, Poland. The local Institutional Ethical Board of K. Marcinkowski University of Medical Sciences has approved the collection and use of biological samples (904/06, 164/10, and 502/15).
Normal epithelial samples (n = 10; 5 men and 5 women), buccal swabs from the oral cavity lining, samples isolated from hypertrophies of vocal folds, and polyps of the vocal folds (n = 10) were collected as the control group. Histologically, these controls derived from the same tissue as the tumor are not neoplastic and do not turn malignant even during a follow-up for many years.
DNA from the cell lines primary tumor and non-cancerous tissue specimens was isolated using standard phenol/chloroform method described elsewhere. 6 DNA from buccal swabs was isolated with the Genomic Mini kit (A&A Biotechnology, Gdynia, Poland) according to the manufacturer’s instructions.
Mutation screen of the PTPRD gene in LSCC cell lines
Coding exons of the
Multiplex reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction for the PTPRD gene
Primer sequences were designed using the Primer3 software (http://bioinfo.ut.ee/primer3-0.4.0/). The multiplex-included primer for amplification of the
RNA from the cell lines was isolated using standard phenol/chloroform method described elsewhere 6 and reverse transcribed using the Enhanced Avian First Strand Synthesis Kit (Sigma-Aldrich, Steinheim, Germany). PCR reactions were performed using the following conditions: at 95°C for 5′, 35 cycles: denaturation at 95°C for 30 s, annealing at 65°C for 30 s, elongation at 72°C for 30 s, and terminal elongation at 72°C for 5′.
The design of bisulfite pyrosequencing assay for PTPRD promoter region DNA methylation analysis
The primer was designed with PyroMark Assay Design Software 2.0 (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany). The assay was analyzed for potential SNP occurrence within the primer binding region. The primer sequences for the
Bisulfite treatment of DNA, PCR reaction, and electrophoresis
Purified DNA (1 µg) was converted with bisulfite solution according to EpiTect DNA Modification Kit Protocol (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany). PCR was performed according to PyroMark PCR Kit (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany) program: at 95°C for 15 min (initial heating), followed by 45 cycles: denaturation for 30 s at 94°C, primer annealing in 60°C for 30 s and extension in 72°C for 30 s, and the final extension in 72°C for 10 min. PCR products were separated on 1.8% agarose gel stained with ethidium bromide and visualized under UV light (BioDoc-it Imaging System, UVP).
Pyrosequencing
Pyrosequencing was performed according to the standard protocol and as described previously. 10 PCR products were mixed with binding buffer (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany) and sepharose coated with streptavidin (GE Healthcare, Chicago, USA), shaked for 10 min and cleaned on vacuum pump station in the following buffers: 70% EtOH, 0.2% NaOH, and washing buffer (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany). Single-strand amplicons were then mixed with annealing buffer (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany), the sequencing primer (0.4 µM), and then heated for 2 min at 85°C and cooled for primer hybridization. Pyrosequencing was performed using the PyroMark Q24 (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany) and the results analyzed using the PyroMark Q24 (2.0.6 Qiagen software), which automatically calculates the G:A “−” strand (de facto mC:C) ratio at the CpG sites. The analyzed sequence was RACAACCTCCCTCRAAAAATAATAATAATAATAATAACCRAAAA (hg19 chr9:10613464-10613481) and enclosed three CG repeats (R). Each pyrosequencing run was accompanied by fully methylated DNA sample (CpG Genome Universal Millipore, Darmstadt, Germany) and unmethylated whole genome amplified (WGA) sample prepared using the GenomePlex® Whole Genome Amplification Kit (Sigma-Aldrich, Steinheim, Germany) from pooled DNA isolated from peripheral blood of 10 healthy donors. The results for each analyzed sample were visualized as value bars of DNA methylation level in each CG repeat separately.
To calculate the normal methylation level for control samples (buccal swabs, hypertrophies of vocal folds, and polyps of the vocal folds), we added the maximal methylation level value observed in controls plus 3 × mean standard deviation of the whole control group. The obtained value was regarded as the “cut-off” level of methylation beyond which a sample was described as methylated.
The Cancer Genome Atlas data mining
We further sought to confirm our methylation data with the public online cancer database: The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) at http://tcga-data.nci.nih.gov/. We downloaded the numerical data from two platforms: Illumina HiSeq mRNA expression RNA-seq V2 data and Illumina Human methylation 450K data for
Results
PTPRD is recurrently transcriptionally silenced but inactivating mutations are rare in LSCC cell lines
In our previous study, we showed recurrent downregulation of

(a) Multiplex RT-PCR for the
In the mutation screen, we identified the homozygous SNP rs35929428 (CADD score, 25.8) in the UT-SCC-11 and UT-SCC-57 cell lines and the heterozygous SNP rs370537821 (CADD score, 9.019) in the UT-SCC-22 cell line. The CADD score suggests that the SNP rs35929428 might possibly be deleterious, whereas the SNP rs370537821 is probably benign. Moreover, we found, in the UT-SCC-6A cell line, a homozygous insertion of 25 nucleotides which due to a repetitive sequence in this locus can be located either in the position chr9:8,331,582 (hg19) in the exon 44 (assigned as rs3215098; NM_002839.3) or in the position chr9:8,331,574 (hg19) located in the intron 44/45 (assigned as rs146237556; NM_002839.3). Interestingly, the SNP rs3215098 leads to the shortened
In conclusion, we identified two SNPs (rs35929428 and rs3215098) which can putatively influence
The promoter region of PTPRD is recurrently hypermethylated in LSCC cell lines and primary tumors
As the mutation screen did not identify frequent loss-of-function mutations, we performed a methylation analysis of the
We then analyzed the 14 LSCC cell lines using the same pyrosequencing assay. Using the cut-off point for methylation (17.05%), we identified 9/14 (64%) LSCC cell lines to have elevated level of methylation, whereas 4 of them (UT-SCC-4, UT-SCC-11, UT-SCC-22, and UT-SCC-29) demonstrated hypermethylation defined as pyrosequencing-result showing methylation >60% (Figure 1(b)). By comparing methylation levels in controls (n = 20) and LSCC cell lines (n = 14) using the unpaired t-test, a significant difference of means (p = 0.001) was found (Figure 1(c)).
To exclude that the observed elevation of methylation is only a feature of cultured cells, we analyzed a cohort of 79 primary LSCC tumors. In line with the observation in cell lines, according to our criteria, we identified elevated methylation in 37/79 (47%) cases, and the mean methylation level of
In conclusion, we found that in contrast to the normal human epithelial cells of the upper aerodigestive tract, LSCC tumors show recurrent elevated methylation of the
PTPRD promoter methylation is significantly correlated with loss of mRNA expression
In order to show that hypermethylation of the

Correlation of
Discussion
The oncogenic potential of protein tyrosine kinases is well characterized and has led to the introduction of several novel therapeutics to daily clinical practice. Recently, increasing attention is focused on the PTPs that physiologically show a suppressive function towards the oncogenic kinases. The tumor suppressive functionality of PTPs, including the
The
Interestingly, it has been suggested recently that not only PTPRs losses result in the deregulation of STAT3 but also point mutations that modulate protein tyrosine phosphatase receptor (PTPR) proteins functionality.18,19 This tempting possibility might be true for a subset of head and neck tumors and present an alternative mechanism for
In conclusion, we provide here further evidence for the importance of
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The study was supported by the Polish National Science Center grants NN401 014840 and 2011/01/D/NZ2/00095 and the Kinderkrebsinitiative Buchholz/Holm-Seppensen (infrastructure to M.G.).
References
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
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