Interaction of Plasminogen and Angiostatin with Heat Shock Proteins.

Previous studies from this laboratory have demonstrated that plasminogen and angiostatin bind to endothelial cell (EC) surface-associated actin via their kringles in a specific manner. Heat shock proteins (hsps) like hsp 27 are constitutively expressed by vascular ECs and regulate actin polymerization, cell growth and migration. Since many hsps have also been found to be highly abundant on cell surfaces and there is evidence that bacterial surface hsps may interact with human plasminogen, the purpose of this study was to determine whether human plasminogen and angiostatin would interact with human hsps. ELISAs were developed in our laboratory to assess these interactions. It was observed that plasminogen bound to hsps 27, 60 and 70. In all cases, binding was inhibited (85–90%) by excess (50 mM) lysine indicating kringle involvement. Angiostatin predominantly bound to hsp 27 and to hsp 70 in a concentration- and kringle-dependent manner. As observed previously for actin, there was dose-dependent inhibition of angiostatin’s interaction with hsp 27 by plasminogen. In addition, thirty-fold molar excess actin inhibited (up to 50%), the interaction of plasminogen with all hsps. However, thirty-fold molar excess actin could only inhibit the interaction of angiostatin with hsp 27 by 15–20%. FACS analyses indicated the presence of hsps 27, 60 and 70 on the surface of MCF-7 breast cancer cells but not on human umbilical vein ECs. Polyclonal antibodies to hsp 27 significantly inhibited the interaction of plasminogen and angiostatin with MCF-7 surface-associated hsp27 in a dose-dependent manner. Collectively, these data indicate that

• while plasminogen interacts specifically with hsp 27, 60 and 70, angiostatin interacts predominantly with hsp 27 and to some extent with hsp 70;

• plasminogen only partially displaces angiostatins binding to hsp 27;

• actin only partially displaces plasminogen/angiostatin binding to hsps and

• surface-associated hsp 27 can mediate the binding of both plasminogen and angiostatin to MCF-7 cells.