SMAD4 Promotes TGF-β-independent NK Cell Homeostasis and Maturation and Antitumor Immunity

Overview

Journal J Clin Invest

Specialty General Medicine

Date 2018 Sep 6

PMID 30183689

Citations 37

Authors

Youwei Wang

Jianhong Chu

Ping Yi

Wenjuan Dong

Jennifer Saultz

Yufeng Wang

Hongwei Wang

Steven Scoville

Jianying Zhang

Lai-Chu Wu

Youcai Deng

Xiaoming He

Bethany Mundy-Bosse

Aharon G Freud

Li-Shu Wang

Michael A Caligiuri

Jianhua Yu

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

SMAD4 is the only common SMAD in TGF-β signaling that usually impedes immune cell activation in the tumor microenvironment. However, we demonstrated here that selective deletion of Smad4 in NK cells actually led to dramatically reduced tumor cell rejection and augmented tumor cell metastases, reduced murine CMV clearance, as well as impeded NK cell homeostasis and maturation. This was associated with a downregulation of granzyme B (Gzmb), Kit, and Prdm1 in Smad4-deficient NK cells. We further unveiled the mechanism by which SMAD4 promotes Gzmb expression. Gzmb was identified as a direct target of a transcriptional complex formed by SMAD4 and JUNB. A JUNB binding site distinct from that for SMAD4 in the proximal Gzmb promoter was required for transcriptional activation by the SMAD4-JUNB complex. In a Tgfbr2 and Smad4 NK cell-specific double-conditional KO model, SMAD4-mediated events were found to be independent of canonical TGF-β signaling. Our study identifies and mechanistically characterizes unusual functions and pathways for SMAD4 in governing innate immune responses to cancer and viral infection, as well as NK cell development.

Citing Articles

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