Abstract
Erythropoietin (Epo) ensures survival and proliferation of colony-forming unit erythroid (CFU-E) progenitor cells and their differentiation to hemoglobin-containing mature erythrocytes. A lack of Epo-induced responses causes embryonic lethality, but mechanisms regulating the dynamic communication of cellular alterations to the organismal level remain unresolved. By time-resolved transcriptomics and proteomics, we show that Epo induces in CFU-E cells a gradual transition from proliferation signature proteins to proteins indicative for differentiation, including heme-synthesis enzymes. In the absence of the Epo receptor (EpoR) in embryos, we observe a lack of hemoglobin in CFU-E cells and massive iron overload of the fetal liver pointing to a miscommunication between liver and placenta. A reduction of iron-sulfur cluster-containing proteins involved in oxidative phosphorylation in these embryos leads to a metabolic shift toward glycolysis. This link connecting erythropoiesis with the regulation of iron homeostasis and metabolic reprogramming suggests that balancing these interactions is crucial for protection from iron intoxication and for survival.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 111360 |
| Journal | Cell Reports |
| Volume | 40 |
| Issue number | 12 |
| ISSN | 2211-1247 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 20.09.2022 |
Funding
We thank Susen Lippmann, Alexander Held, and Marvin Wäsch for excellent technical assistance. We thank Tonmoy Das for assisting in the illustrations and graphical design. We acknowledge support from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research ( BMBF ) within the e:Bio collaborative research project Systems Biology of Erythropoietin (SBEpo; S.C., L.A., M.S., U.K., G.A., H.B., and M.B.), the framework of the e:Med research and funding concept (M.B.), the German Center for Lung Research (DZL; M.E.B., M.U.M., and U.K.), the Medical Informatics Funding Scheme MIRACUM-FKZ 01ZZ1801B (M.B.), EkoEstMed-FKZ 01ZZ2015 (G.A.), the LiSyM network (U.K.), the LiSyM-Cancer networks SMART-NAFLD (U.K.) and C-TIP-HCC (U.K.), and the MSCoreSys network SMART-CARE (B.H. and U.K.). We also acknowledge support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft ( DFG ) within the Cluster of Excellence 306 Inflammation at Interfaces (H.B.), the CRC1453 (Project ID 431984000-S1, M.B.), CRC1160 (Z02, M.B.), TRR 167 (Z01, M.B.), SFB 1118 (M.U.M.), FerrOs – FOR5146 (M.U.M., S.A., P.K., and U.K.), and SPP2306 (M.U.M.). We further acknowledge support from the Helmholtz International Graduate School for Cancer Research at the German Cancer Research Center ( DKFZ ) (S.C. and L.A.), the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (A New Passage to India; M.U.M.), and the Dietmar Hopp foundation (M.U.M.).