RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Pulsed stimuli entrain p53 to synchronize single cells and modulate cell-fate determination
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2023.10.24.563786
DO 10.1101/2023.10.24.563786
A1 Venkatachalapathy, Harish
A1 Yang, Zhilin
A1 Azarin, Samira M.
A1 Sarkar, Casim A.
A1 Batchelor, Eric
YR 2023
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2023/11/15/2023.10.24.563786.abstract
AB Entrainment to an external stimulus enables a synchronized oscillatory response across a population of cells, increasing coherent responses by reducing cell-to-cell heterogeneity. It is unclear whether the property of entrainability extends to systems where responses are intrinsic to the individual cell, rather than dependent on coherence across a population of cells. Using a combination of mathematical modeling, time-lapse fluorescence microscopy, and single-cell tracking, we demonstrated that p53 oscillations triggered by DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) can be entrained with a periodic damage stimulus, despite such synchrony not known to function in effective DNA damage responses. Surprisingly, p53 oscillations were experimentally entrained over a wider range of DSB frequencies than predicted by an established computational model for the system. We determined that recapitulating the increased range of entrainment frequencies required, non-intuitively, a less robust oscillator and wider steady-state valley on the energy landscape. Further, we show that p53 entrainment can lead to altered expression dynamics of downstream targets responsible for cell fate in a manner dependent on target mRNA stability. Overall, this study demonstrates that entrainment can occur in a biological oscillator despite the apparent lack of an evolutionary advantage conferred through synchronized responses and highlights the potential of externally entraining p53 dynamics to reduce cellular variability and synchronize cell-fate responses for therapeutic outcomes.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.