Inactivation of PI 3‐kinase (PI3K) signalling is critical for tumour suppression by PTEN. This is thought to be a unidirectional relationship in which PTEN degrades the lipids produced by PI3K, thus controlling cell proliferation, survival and migration. We now show that this relationship is in fact bidirectional, whereby PI3K reciprocally controls PTEN. We report that the p110δ PI3K negatively regulates PTEN, through a pathway involving inhibition of RhoA. Inactivation of p110δ in macrophages led to reduced Akt and Rac1 activation, but paradoxically to increased RhoA and PTEN activity. Partial inactivation of p190RhoGAP and a reduced binding of cytoplasmic RhoA to the cyclin‐dependent kinase inhibitor p27 both contributed to the increased RhoA‐GTP levels upon p110δ inactivation. Pharmacological inhibition of ROCK, a downstream effector kinase of RhoA, restored all signalling and functional defects of p110δ inactivation, including Akt phosphorylation, chemotaxis and proliferation. This work identifies the RhoA/ROCK pathway as a major target of p110δ‐mediated PI3K signalling, and establishes for the first time that PI3K controls itself, via a feedback loop involving PTEN.

The role of PTEN as a tumour suppressor has been for a long time attributed to its lipid phosphatase activity against PI(3,4,5)P3, the phospholipid product of the class I PI3Ks. Besides its traditional role as a lipid phosphatase at the plasma membrane, a wealth of data has shown that PTEN can function independently of its phosphatase activity and that PTEN also exists and plays a role in the nucleus, in cytoplasmic organelles and extracellularly. Accumulating evidence has shed light on diverse physiological functions of PTEN which are accompanied by a complex regulation of its expression and activity. PTEN levels and function are regulated transcriptionally, post-transcriptionally and post-translationally. PTEN is also sensitive to regulation by its interacting proteins and its localization. Herein, we summarize the current knowledge on mechanisms that regulate the expression and enzymatic activity of PTEN and its role in human diseases.

Nongenomic androgen actions imply mechanisms different from the classical intracellular androgen receptor (iAR) activation. We have recently reported the identification of a membrane androgen receptor (mAR) on LNCaP human prostate cancer cells, mediating testosterone signal transduction within minutes. In the present study we provide evidence that activation of mAR by nonpermeable, BSA-coupled testosterone results in 1) inhibition of LNCaP cell growth (with a 50% inhibitory concentration of 5.08 nM, similar to the affinity of testosterone for membrane sites); 2) induction in LNCaP cells of both apoptosis and the proapoptotic Fas protein; and 3) a significant decrease in migration, adhesion, and invasion of iAR-negative DU145 human prostate cancer cells. These actions persisted in the presence of antiandrogen flutamide or after decreasing the content of iAR in LNCaP cells by iAR antisense oligonucleotides. Testosterone-BSA was also effective in inducing apoptosis of DU145 human prostate cancer cells, negative for iAR, but expressing mAR sites. In LNCaP cell-inoculated nude mice, treatment with testosterone-BSA (4.8 mg/kg body weight) for 1 month resulted in a 60% reduction of tumor size compared with that in control animals receiving only BSA, an effect that was not affected by the antiandrogen flutamide. Our findings suggest that activators of mAR may represent a new class of antitumoral agents of prostate cancer.

The human prostate cancer cell line LNCaP bears functional membrane testosterone receptors, which modify the actin cytoskeleton and increase the secretion of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) within minutes. Membrane steroid receptors are, indeed, a newly identified element of steroid action that is different from the classical intracellular sites. In the present work, using a nonpermeable analog of testosterone (testosterone-BSA), we investigated the signaling pathway that is triggered by the membrane testosterone receptors' activation and leads to actin cytoskeleton reorganization. We report that exposure of cells to testosterone-BSA resulted in phosphorylation of focal adhesion kinase (FAK), the association of FAK with the phosphatidylinositol-3 (PI-3) kinase, and the subsequent activation of the latter as well as the activation of the small guanosine triphosphatases Cdc42/Rac1. Pretreatment of cells with the specific PI-3 kinase inhibitor wortmannin abolished both the activation of the small guanosine triphosphatases and the alterations of actin cytoskeleton, whereas it did not affect the phosphorylation of FAK. These findings indicate that PI-3 kinase is activated downstream of FAK and upstream of Cdc42/Rac1, which subsequently regulate the actin organization. Moreover, wortmannin diminished the secretion of PSA, implying that the signaling events described above are responsible for the testosterone-BSA-induced PSA secretion. Our results are discussed under the prism of a possible implication of these membrane receptors in prostate cancer chemotherapy.