Antimitogenic effects of dexamethasone in chemically transformed mouse fibroblasts

Dexamethasone (a synthetic glucocorticoid) inhibited the entry into the S-phase of quiescent chemically transformed mouse fibroblasts (BP-A31) stimulated with 12-O-tetradecanoyl 13-acetate (TPA; a protein kinase-C activator) or with basic fibroblast growth factor. The basal rate of DNA synthesis was also strongly reduced by dexamethasone. In contrast, the mitogenic activity of insulin (acting via the insulin-like growth factor-I receptor) was little or not at all affected by dexamethasone. The antimitogenic activity of dexamethasone was enhanced when the steroid was included in the culture medium 24 h before the addition of mitogens. The effects of dexamethasone were glucocorticoid specific, partially reversed by the antiglucocorticoid RU 486, and prevented by cycloheximide (suggesting the involvement of glucocorticoid-induced protein synthesis in the antimitogenic activity of dexamethasone). Under the conditions of exponential growth in serum-free medium as well as in the presence of TPA, dexamethasone arrested the proliferation of sparsely seeded cells after a delay of 24-48 h. The BP-A31 cells are known to be constitutively competent and express at quiescence certain genes related to the G0/G1 transition in the original nontransformed A31 cell line. Of the transcripts corresponding to these genes, dexamethasone caused a rapid elimination of the JE mRNA, coding for a protein of the family of cytokines. The cell content of c-jun mRNA was also strongly reduced in the cells incubated at quiescence with dexamethasone (in the absence of mitogen). The presence of TPA along with dexamethasone prevented the elimination of c-jun, but not of JE mRNA. Short (30-min; together with the inducers) or long (24-h) treatment of the cells with dexamethasone did not prevent the induction of the c-fos gene expression by either TPA or basic fibroblast growth factor, indicating that dexamethasone does not interfere with mitogenic signal transduction. We conclude that in TPA-stimulated cells, the antiproliferative effect of dexamethasone is not due to interference with the expression of the c-jun gene, but may be related to the decreased level of the JE cytokine mRNA as well as to the synthesis of growth inhibitory protein(s).