Functional relationship among PLK2, PLK4 and ROCK2 to induce centrosome amplification

The presence of more than 2 centrosomes (centrosome amplification) leads to defective mitosis and chromosome segregation errors, is frequently found in a variety of cancer types, and believed to be the major cause of chromosome instability. One mechanism for generation of amplified centrosomes is over-duplication of centrosomes in a single cell cycle, which is expected to occur when cells are temporarily arrested. There are a growing number of kinases that are critical for induction and promotion of centrosome amplification in the cell cycle-arrested cells, including Rho-associated kinase (ROCK2), Polo-like kinase 2 (PLK2) and PLK4. Here, we tested whether these kinases induce centrosome amplification in a linear pathway or parallel pathways. We first confirmed that ROCK2, PLK2 and PLK4 are all essential for centrosomes to re-duplicate in the cells arrested by exposure to DNA synthesis inhibitor. Using the centrosome amplification rescue assay, we found that PLK2 indirectly activates ROCK2 via phosphorylating nucleophosmin (NPM), and PLK4 functions downstream of ROCK2 to drive centrosome amplification in the arrested cells.