TY - JOUR A1 - Lorenz, Kristina A1 - Rosner, Marsha Rich T1 - Harnessing RKIP to combat heart disease and cancer JF - Cancers N2 - Cancer and heart disease are leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. These diseases have common risk factors, common molecular signaling pathways that are central to their pathogenesis, and even some disease phenotypes that are interdependent. Thus, a detailed understanding of common regulators is critical for the development of new and synergistic therapeutic strategies. The Raf kinase inhibitory protein (RKIP) is a regulator of the cellular kinome that functions to maintain cellular robustness and prevent the progression of diseases including heart disease and cancer. Two of the key signaling pathways controlled by RKIP are the β-adrenergic receptor (βAR) signaling to protein kinase A (PKA), particularly in the heart, and the MAP kinase cascade Raf/MEK/ERK1/2 that regulates multiple diseases. The goal of this review is to discuss how we can leverage RKIP to suppress cancer without incurring deleterious effects on the heart. Specifically, we discuss: (1) How RKIP functions to either suppress or activate βAR (PKA) and ERK1/2 signaling; (2) How we can prevent cancer-promoting kinase signaling while at the same time avoiding cardiotoxicity. KW - RKIP KW - ERK1/2 KW - PKA KW - βAR KW - heart failure KW - cancer Y1 - 2022 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-262185 SN - 2072-6694 VL - 14 IS - 4 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Schanbacher, Constanze A1 - Bieber, Michael A1 - Reinders, Yvonne A1 - Cherpokova, Deya A1 - Teichert, Christina A1 - Nieswandt, Bernhard A1 - Sickmann, Albert A1 - Kleinschnitz, Christoph A1 - Langhauser, Friederike A1 - Lorenz, Kristina T1 - ERK1/2 activity is critical for the outcome of ischemic stroke JF - International Journal of Molecular Sciences N2 - Ischemic disorders are the leading cause of death worldwide. The extracellular signal-regulated kinases 1 and 2 (ERK1/2) are thought to affect the outcome of ischemic stroke. However, it is under debate whether activation or inhibition of ERK1/2 is beneficial. In this study, we report that the ubiquitous overexpression of wild-type ERK2 in mice (ERK2\(^{wt}\)) is detrimental after transient occlusion of the middle cerebral artery (tMCAO), as it led to a massive increase in infarct volume and neurological deficits by increasing blood–brain barrier (BBB) leakiness, inflammation, and the number of apoptotic neurons. To compare ERK1/2 activation and inhibition side-by-side, we also used mice with ubiquitous overexpression of the Raf-kinase inhibitor protein (RKIP\(^{wt}\)) and its phosphorylation-deficient mutant RKIP\(^{S153A}\), known inhibitors of the ERK1/2 signaling cascade. RKIP\(^{wt}\) and RKIP\(^{S153A}\) attenuated ischemia-induced damages, in particular via anti-inflammatory signaling. Taken together, our data suggest that stimulation of the Raf/MEK/ERK1/2-cascade is severely detrimental and its inhibition is rather protective. Thus, a tight control of the ERK1/2 signaling is essential for the outcome in response to ischemic stroke. KW - ERK1/2 KW - tMCAO KW - ischemic stroke KW - RKIP Y1 - 2022 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-283991 SN - 1422-0067 VL - 23 IS - 2 ER -