Fibrillogenic amylin evokes islet β-cell apoptosis through linked activation of a caspase cascade and JNK1

Fibrillogenic human amylin elicits pancreatic beta-cell apoptosis that may contribute to development of type-2 diabetes. Here, we demonstrated that activation of a caspase cascade is necessary for induction of apoptosis by fibrillogenic amylin variants in two pancreatic beta-cell lines. Human amylin, as well as truncated (8-37)human amylin, evoked sequential activation of caspases-8 and -3, and apoptosis, whereas non-beta-sheet forming and non-fibrillogenic homologs, such as [(25,28,29)triprolyl]human amylin, did not, implying that the beta-sheet conformer is required for human amylin-induced caspase activation. Significant inhibition of apoptosis was evoked by a selective caspase-1 inhibitor, indicating that caspase-1 is also essential for activation of the caspase cascade. Furthermore, we showed that specific jnk1 antisense oligonucleotides, which suppress phospho-JNK1 expression, effectively decreased human amylin-induced activation of c-Jun. Studies of the interplay between the caspase cascade and the JNK pathway showed that both apoptosis and caspase-3 activation were suppressed by treatment with a JNK inhibitor and by transfection of antisense jnk1 oligonucleotides or antisense-c-jun, whereas a selective inhibitor of caspases-1 and -3 prevented apoptosis but not c-Jun activation. Thus, the JNK1 activation preceded activation of caspases-1 and -3. However, selective JNK inhibition had no effect on caspase-8 activation, and selective caspase-8 inhibition only partially suppressed apoptosis and c-Jun activation, indicating that caspase-8 may partially act upstream of the JNK pathway. Our studies demonstrate a functional interaction of a caspase cascade and JNK1. Fibrillogenic amylin can evoke a JNK1-mediated apoptotic pathway, which is partially dependent and partially independent of caspase-8, and in which caspase-3 acts as a common downstream effector.