The RNA Aptamer Inhibiting Human Vesicular Endothelial Growth Factor Receptor 1 without Affecting Cytokine Binding

详细信息    查看全文

• 作者：Shoji P. Ohuchi ; Masabumi Shibuya ; Yoshikazu Nakamura
• 刊名：Biochemistry
• 出版年：2013
• 出版时间：April 2, 2013
• 年：2013
• 卷：52
• 期：13
• 页码：2274-2279
• 全文大小：272K
• 年卷期：v.52,no.13(April 2, 2013)
• ISSN：1520-4995

文摘

Angiogenesis, a process of new blood vessel formation, is crucial not only for many physiological events but also for a number of diseases. The signaling pathways through members of the vesicular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) family play fundamental roles in angiogenesis. In this study, we identified inhibitory RNA aptamers against human Flt-1, a receptor of VEGF. One of the isolates, aptamer #38, showed a 50% inhibitory concentration (IC₅₀) of 23 nM in the cell-based autophosphorylation assay, and the IC₅₀ value was decreased to 6.3 nM upon removal of 32 dispensable nucleotides from parental #38 with a length of 72 nucleotides. Interestingly, the surface plasmon resonance-based or affinity resin-based binding study revealed that #38 and its shortened derivative, #38Jr, do not interfere with binding of VEGF or heparin, a functional cofactor, to Flt-1. Importantly, aptamer #38 does not affect the decoy activity of soluble Flt-1. These findings suggest that #38 prevents the conformational activation of Flt-1 associated with VEGF. Therefore, aptamer #38 might provide us with a unique tool for blocking the VEGF signaling specific to Flt-1, unlike most other known VEGF signaling blockers such as VEGF inhibitors, anti-Flt-1 antibodies, and decoy soluble receptors.