RNA helicase DHX15 exemplifies a unique dependency in acute leukemia

Haematologica. 2023 Aug 1;108(8):2029-2043. doi: 10.3324/haematol.2022.282066.

Abstract

RNA-binding proteins (RBP) have emerged as essential regulators that control gene expression and modulate multiple cancer traits. T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) is an aggressive hematologic malignancy derived from transformation of T-cell progenitors that normally undergo discrete steps of differentiation in the thymus. The implications of essential RBP during T-cell neoplastic transformation remain largely unclear. Systematic evaluation of RBP identifies RNA helicase DHX15, which facilitates the disassembly of the spliceosome and release of lariat introns, as a T-ALL dependency factor. Functional analysis using multiple murine T-ALL models demonstrates the essential importance of DHX15 in tumor cell survival and leukemogenesis. Moreover, single-cell transcriptomics reveals that DHX15 depletion in T-cell progenitors hinders burst proliferation during the transition from doublenegative to double-positive cells (CD4-CD8- to CD4+CD8+). Mechanistically, abrogation of DHX15 perturbs RNA splicing and leads to diminished levels of SLC7A6 and SLC38A5 transcripts due to intron retention, thereby suppressing glutamine import and mTORC1 activity. We further propose a DHX15 signature modulator drug ciclopirox and demonstrate that it has prominent anti-T-ALL efficacy. Collectively, our data highlight the functional contribution of DHX15 to leukemogenesis through regulation of established oncogenic pathways. These findings also suggest a promising therapeutic approach, i.e., splicing perturbation by targeting spliceosome disassembly, may achieve considerable anti-tumor efficacy.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Amino Acid Transport Systems, Basic / genetics
  • Amino Acid Transport Systems, Basic / metabolism
  • Animals
  • Humans
  • Leukemia* / metabolism
  • Mice
  • RNA Helicases* / genetics
  • RNA Helicases* / metabolism
  • RNA Splicing
  • Spliceosomes / genetics

Substances

  • RNA Helicases
  • SLC7A6 protein, human
  • Amino Acid Transport Systems, Basic

Grants and funding

Funding: This study was supported by grants from the National Key R&D Program of China (2022YFA1103200), National Natural Science Foundation of China (82161138024, 82025003 and 82011530151 to HL, 81830084 to GQ, 32170565 to ZL), Hubei Provincial Natural Science Fund for Creative Research Groups (2021CFA003 to HL), the Research Foundation Flanders (G0E6222N to PVV) and CAS Hundred Talents Program to ZL.