[Development of the protein therapeutics using the super anti-cell death factor FNK]

A powerful artificial anti-apoptotic factor will be useful for the reproductive therapies for many diseases by prolonging survival of stem cells. For constructing it, we designed the super anti-apoptotic factor by disturbing three intramolecular polar interactions among alpha-helix structures of Bcl-xL. The resultant mutant Bcl-xL, named FNK, was expected to make the pore-forming domain more mobile and flexible than the wild-type. When overexpressed in Jurkat cells, FNK was markedly more potent in prolonging survival following apoptosis-inducing treatment with a kind of cell death cytokines (anti-Fas), a protein kinase inhibitor (staurosporine), cell cycle inhibitors (TN-16, camptothecin, hydroxyurea and trichostatin A) or oxidative stress (hydrogen peroxide and paraquat) than wild-type Bcl-xL. Furthermore, the transfectants of FNK became more resistant against a calcium ionophore and even a heat treatment than wild-type Bcl-xL. In addition, FNK showed marked anti-apoptotic activity in CHO and Jurkat cells deprived of serum. Thus, FNK may be the first mutant generated by site-directed mutagenesis of Bcl-xL with an enhance gain-of-function phenotype. Next, we tried to transduce the FNK protein into cells. Protein therapeutics has the advantage of delivering proteins in a short period of time. We have engineered the anti-apoptotic bcl-x gene to generate the super anti-apoptotic factor, FNK, with a more powerful cytoprotective activity. In this study, we fused the protein transduction domain (PTD) of the HIV/Tat protein to FNK, and used the construct in an animal model of ischemic brain injury. When added into culture media of human neuroblastoma cells and rat neocortical neurons, PTD-FNK rapidly transduced into cells and localized to mitochondria within 1 hr. It protected the neuroblastomas and neurons against staurosporine-induced apoptosis and glutamate-induced excitotoxicity, respectively. The cytoprotective activity of PTD-FNK was found at concentrations as low as 0.3 pM. Additionally, PTD-FNK affected the cytosolic movement of calcium ions, which may relate to its neuroprotective action. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed that myc-tagged PTD-FNK (PTD-myc-FNK) injected intraperitoneally into mice can have access into brain neurons. When injected intraperitoneally into gerbils, PTD-FNK prevented delayed neuronal death in the hippocampus caused by transient global ischemia. These results suggest that PTD-FNK has a potential for clinical utility as a novel protein therapeutic strategy to prevent cell death in the brain. Thus, the protein delivery system will be useful to make cells survived for a long time during the differentiation of stem cells in the reproductive therapies.