Lipid-anchored Proteasomes Control Membrane Protein Homeostasis

As the major protein degradation machinery of eukaryotic cells, the 26S proteasome is generally thought to localize in the nucleus and cytosol. A portion of proteasomes are known to associate with various membrane structures of the cell, the mechanism and biological meaning of which have been elusive. Here we show that N-myristoylation of the proteasome subunit Rpt2 is an evolutionarily conserved determinant of proteasome-membrane interaction. Loss of this modification leads to embryonic lethality in mice, significant reduction of migration ability in MEFs and profound changes in the membrane-associated proteome as determined by SILAC-MS, suggesting a key role of membrane-tethered proteasomes in carrying out compartmentalized protein degradation. And the tumorigenicity is reduced in the oncogene-transformed MEF without modification. Serendipitously, we found that the Rpt2-G2A mutation cell lines confers partial resistance to proteasome inhibitors, such as Bortezomib and MG132. Thus, N-myristoylation of Rpt2 determines the localization and activity of the proteasome at the membrane, which is critical for embryogenesis, cellular homeostasis and tumorigenesis. Total RNA was isolated from immortalized MEFs or 3 pairs (WT and G2A littermates) of E12.5 fetal livers using the Trizol method. Next-generation sequencing was done by BGI (Shenzhen, China).