1D). Protein levels of cdc2, cdk4, and cyclin D3 were increased in livers of FXR/SHP KO mice (Fig. 1C). We next buy Midostaurin asked whether gankyrin is activated in FXR/SHP KO mice during the early stages of liver cancer. Examination of 6-month-old mice revealed that gankyrin increased significantly in livers of FXR/SHP KO mice; however, C/EBPα levels were reduced only slightly (Fig. 1E). Because the ph-S193 isoform of C/EBPα is a target of gankyrin, we suggested that the remaining 40%-50% of C/EBPα might not be phosphorylated at S193. We have shown that

the phosphatase PP2A eliminates the phosphate from S193.20 Our studies of FXR/SHP mice revealed that PP2A was increased and the ph-S193 isoform of C/EBPα was not detectable in the nuclear extracts of livers from 6-month-old FXR/SHP KO mice (Fig. 1E). We also found that the enzymes, which phosphorylate C/EBPα at S193, were weakly activated at this age in FXR/SHP KO mice (Supporting

Fig. 1A,B). We next examined whether spontaneous liver tumors might have reduced FXR. Western blotting with proteins from liver tumors of 24-month-old mice revealed a reduction of FXR and elevation of gankyrin (Fig. 2A,B). Consistent with data in FXR/SHP KO mice, protein levels of C/EBPα were reduced in these tumor samples, whereas the levels of C/EBPα mRNA were unchanged (data not shown). We further examined expression of FXR, gankyrin, and C/EBPα in the livers of four patients with advanced liver cancer and in four normal patients. Figure 2C shows that FXR was reduced to 15%-20% in all examined tumor samples and that gankyrin was elevated in these samples. Western blot buy EPZ-6438 analysis revealed that C/EBPα was dramatically reduced in all human tumor samples. Thus, these studies revealed that spontaneous development of liver cancer in mice and in humans involves reduction of FXR, elevation of gankyrin, and reduction of C/EBPα. The search for the FXR binding sites revealed why no consensuses within the 1.4-kb region of the mouse gankyrin promoter, suggesting indirect mechanisms of the FXR-mediated repression of the promoter. Previous studies revealed that FXR

directly binds to the C/EBPβ promoter21 and that C/EBPβ-HDAC1 complexes are abundant in the liver and repress C/EBP-dependent promoters.19 Therefore, we hypothesized that FXR might repress the gankyrin promoter through C/EBPβ-HDAC1 complexes. We found that the gankyrin promoter contained two consensuses for C/EBPβ and that C/EBPα and C/EBPβ bound to the gankyrin promoter in vitro (Fig. 3A,B). ChIP assay revealed that C/EBPα, C/EBPβ, and HDAC1 occupied the gankyrin promoter in the livers of WT animals. However, C/EBPβ and HDAC1 were not observed on the gankyrin promoter in livers of FXR/SHP KO mice (Fig. 3C). In agreement with these data, the activation of FXR in cultured mouse Hepa 1-6 cells by the ligands chenodeoxycholic acid (CDCA) and GW4064 reduced levels of gankyrin protein (Fig.