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Anti-cancer immunotherapies commonly rely on the use of interleukin-2 (IL-2) to promote the expansion of T lymphocytes. IL-2- dependent proliferation is the culmination of a complex network of phosphorylation-driven signaling events that impact on gene transcription through mechanisms that are not clearly understood. To study the role of IL-2 in the regulation of nuclear protein function we have performed an unbiased mass spectrometry-based study of the nuclear phosphoproteome of resting and IL-2-treated CD4(+) T lymphocytes. We detected 8521distinct phosphosites including many that are not yet reported in curated phosphorylation databases. Although most phosphorylation sites remained unaffected upon IL-2 treatment, 391 sites corresponding to 288 gene products showed robust IL-2-dependent regulation. Importantly, we show that ATP-citrate lyase (ACLY) is a key phosphoprotein effector of IL-2-mediated T-cell responses. ACLY becomes phosphorylated on serine 455 in T lymphocytes upon IL-2-driven activation of AKT, and depletion or inactivation of ACLY compromises IL-2-promoted T-cell growth. Mechanistically, we demonstrate that ACLY is required for enhancing histone acetylation levels and inducing the expression of cell cycle regulating genes in response to IL-2. Thus, the metabolic enzyme ACLY emerges as a bridge between cytokine signaling and proliferation of T lymphocytes, and may be an attractive candidate target for the development of more efficient anti-cancer immunotherapies., (© 2016 by The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Inc.)

Small GTPases of the Rho family have been implicated in important cellular processes such as cell migration and adhesion, protein secretion, and/or gene transcription. In the lymphoid system, these GTPases participate in the signaling cascades that are activated after engagement of antigen receptors. However, little is known about the role that Rho GTPases play in IL-2-mediated responses. Here, we show that IL-2 induces Rac1 activation in Kit 225 T cells. We identified by mass spectrometry the muscle isoform of glycogen phosphorylase (PYGM) as a novel Rac1 effector molecule in IL-2-stimulated cells. The interaction between the active form of Rac1 (Rac1-GTP) and PYGM was established directly through a domain comprising amino acids 191-270 of PYGM that exhibits significant homology with the Rac binding domain of PAK1. The integrity of this region was crucial for PYGM activation. Importantly, IL-2-dependent cellular proliferation was inhibited upon blocking both the activation of Rac1 and the activity of PYGM. These results reveal a new role for Rac1 in cell signaling, showing that this GTPase triggers T cell proliferation upon IL-2 stimulation by associating with PYGM and modulating its enzymatic activity.

Interleukin-2 (IL-2) is major cytokine involved in T cell proliferation, differentiation and apoptosis. Association between IL-2 and its receptor (IL-2R), triggers activation of complex signaling cascade governed by tyrosine phosphorylation that culminates in transcription of genes involved in modulation of the immune response. The complete characterization of the IL-2 pathway is essential to understand how aberrant IL-2 signaling results in several diseases such as cancer or autoimmunity and also how IL-2 treatments affect cancer patients. To gain insights into the downstream machinery activated by IL-2, we aimed to define the global tyrosine-phosphoproteome of IL-2 pathway in human T cell line Kit225 using high resolution mass spectrometry combined with phosphotyrosine immunoprecipitation and SILAC. The molecular snapshot at 5min of IL-2 stimulation resulted in identification of 172 proteins among which 79 were found with increased abundance in the tyrosine-phosphorylated complexes, including several previously not reported IL-2 downstream effectors. Combinatorial site-specific phosphoproteomic analysis resulted in identification of 99 phosphorylated sites mapping to the identified proteins with increased abundance in the tyrosine-phosphorylated complexes, of which 34 were not previously described. In addition, chemical inhibition of the identified IL-2-mediated JAK, PI3K and MAPK signaling pathways, resulted in distinct alteration on the IL-2 dependent proliferation., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

It is well established that T cell maturation and activation are negatively regulated by a mechanism termed apoptosis. We now present evidence that glucocorticoids, known to possess immunosuppressive properties, cause apoptosis in mature Th cells, similarly to what has been reported for thymocytes. Th cells treated with the synthetic glucocorticoid dexamethasone show genome fragmentation into oligonucleosomal fragments, and proliferation of growth factor stimulated Th cells is inhibited by glucocorticoids. We show that IL-4 specifically rescues Th2 cells from dexamethasone-mediated apoptosis, whereas IL-2 and IL-1 are ineffective in these cells. However, IL-2 is the relevant rescue-factor of glucocorticoid-treated Th1 cells. The rescue induced by IL-4 and IL-2 is thought to be mediated by protein kinases (possibly protein kinase C), as evidenced by the fact that the protein kinase inhibitor H7 blocks the action of IL-4 and IL-2 in glucocorticoid-treated cells. Our in vitro data show that mature T cells can be protected by their own growth factors from the deleterious effects of the synthetic glucocorticoid dexamethasone, and suggest that specific interactions occur between lymphokines and naturally produced glucocorticoids in vivo, which may play a role in the regulation of the immune response.

Lymphokine production is regulated both at the transcriptional and the posttranscriptional level. To date, it has been shown that the protein synthesis inhibitor cycloheximide (CHX) up-regulates IL-2 expression in T cells by stabilizing its mRNA. In this report we have examined the effect of CHX on IL-2 at the transcriptional level. We have found that CHX has a positive regulatory function in IL-2 transcription, which is dependent on prior activation of this gene. This is not due to posttranslational conversion of inactive NFkB into its active form by CHX, because a clustered mutation in the kB-like sequence in the IL-2 enhancer that abrogates NFkB binding does not affect the up-regulation of IL-2 transcription. These results favor the hypothesis that, in addition to positive factors, negative elements regulate IL-2 transcription. Furthermore, we have tested the effect of CHX on IL-4 and granulocyte-macrophage-CSF transcription of both lymphokines. These results suggest that transcriptional up-regulation by CHX may be specific for IL-2 with respect to lymphokine expression.