Tumor Cell Death Mediated by Peptides That Recognize Branched Intermediates of DNA Replication and Repair

Effective treatments for cancer are still needed, both for cancers that do not respond well to current therapeutics and for cancers that become resistant to available treatments. Herein we investigated the effect of a structure-selective d-amino acid peptide wrwycr that binds replication fork mimics and Holliday Junction (HJs) intermediates of homologous recombination (HR) in vitro, and inhibits their resolution by HJ-processing enzymes. We predicted that treating cells with HJ-binding compounds would lead to accumulation of DNA damage. As cells repair endogenous or exogenous DNA damage, collapsed replication forks and HJ intermediates will accumulate and serve as targets for the HJ-binding peptides. Inhibiting junction resolution will lead to further accumulation of DNA breaks, eventually resulting in amplification of the damage and causing cell death. Both peptide wrwycr and the related wrwyrggrywrw entered cancer cells and reduced cell survival in a dose- and time-dependent manner. Early markers for DNA damage, γH2AX foci and 53BP1 foci, increased with dose and/or time exposure to the peptides. DNA breaks persisted at least 48 h, and both checkpoint proteins Chk1 and Chk2 were activated. The passage of the cells from S to G2/M was blocked even after 72 h. Apoptosis, however, was not induced in either HeLa or PC3 cells. Based on colony-forming assays, about 35% peptide-induced cytotoxicity was irreversible. Finally, sublethal doses of peptide wrwycr (50-100 µM) in conjunction with sublethal doses of several DNA damaging agents (etoposide, doxorubicin, and HU) reduced cell survival at least additively and sometimes synergistically. Taken together, the results suggest that the peptides merit further investigation as proof-of-principle molecules for a new class of anti-cancer therapeutics, in particular in combination with other DNA damaging therapies.