Mechanism of RAF isoform switching induced by oncogenic RAS in melanoma

BRAF and RAS are often mutated in cutaneous melanoma and both mutations stimulate the MAPK pathway. However the biological consequences of BRAF and NRAS mutations are different because when RAS is mutated in melanoma, cells use CRAF rather than BRAF to activate MEK/ERK. The mechanism of this BRAF to CRAF isoform switching in response to oncogenic RAS has recently been described. Activation of the MAPK pathway, which results from a mutation of NRAS, induces phosphorylation of BRAF on serine 151 by ERK which prevents its binding to NRAS. To circumvent this negative feedback inhibition of BRAF, melanoma cells containing a mutation of RAS use CRAF to activate MEK/ERK. However, because the cAMP pathway in melanocytes constitutively inhibits CRAF, RAF isoform switching in melanoma is accompanied by an inhibition of the cAMP pathway. This inhibition is due to an increase in phosphodiesterase activity, which degrades cAMP thereby preventing inhibition of CRAF by PKA. These data highlight the importance of CRAF downstream of oncogenic Ras in tumor development.