LRH-1 governs vital transcriptional programs in endocrine sensitive and resistant breast cancer cells: Expression profiling

Tumor characteristics are decisive in the determination of treatment strategy for breast cancer patients. Patients with estrogen receptor- (ER) positive breast cancer can benefit from long-term hormonal treatment. Nonetheless, the majority of patients will develop resistance to these therapies. Here, we investigated the role of the liver receptor homolog-1 (LRH-1, NR5A2) in anti-estrogen (AE) sensitive and resistant breast cancer cells. We identified genome-wide LRH-1 binding sites using ChIP-seq, uncovering preferential binding to regions distal to transcriptional start sites (TSS). We further characterized these LRH-1 binding sites by integrating overlapping layers of specific chromatin marks, revealing that many LRH-1 binding sites are active and could be involved in long-range enhancer-promoter looping. Combined with transcriptome analysis of LRH-1 depleted cells, these results show that LRH-1 regulates specific subsets of genes involved in cell proliferation in AE-sensitive and AE-resistant breast cancer cells. Furthermore, the LRH-1 transcriptional program is highly associated with signature of poor outcome breast cancer tumors in vivo. Herein report the genome-wide location and molecular function of LRH-1 in breast cancer cells and reveal its therapeutic potential for the treatment of breast cancers, notably for tumors resistant to treatments currently used in therapies.

12

Bianco S, Brunelle M, Jangal M, Magnani L, Gévry N