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Background  Cholesterol plays vital roles in human physiology; abnormal levels have deleterious pathological consequences. In cancer, elevated or reduced expression of cholesterol biosynthesis is associated with good or poor prognosis, but the underlying mechanisms are largely unknown. The limonoid compounds A1542 and A1543 stimulate ERK/MAPK by direct binding, leading to leukemic cell death and suppression of leukemia in mouse models. In this study, we investigated the downstream consequences of these ERK/MAPK agonists in leukemic cells.    Methods  We employed RNAseq analysis combined with Q-RT-PCR, western blot and bioinformatics to identify and confirm genes whose expression was altered by A1542 and A1543 in leukemic cells. ShRNA lentiviruses were used to silence gene expression. Cell culture and an animal model (BALB/c) of erythroleukemia induced by Friend virus were utilized to validate effects of cholesterol on leukemia progression.    Results  RNAseq analysis of A1542-treated cells revealed the induction of all 18 genes implicated in cholesterol biosynthesis. Expression of these cholesterol genes was blocked by cedrelone, an ERK inhibitor. The cholesterol inhibitor lovastatin diminished ERK/MAPK activation by A1542, thereby reducing leukemic cell death induced by this ERK1/2 agonist. Growth inhibition by cholesterol was observed both at the intracellular level, and when orally administrated into a leukemic mouse model. Both HDL and LDL also suppressed leukemogenesis, implicating these lipids as important prognostic markers for leukemia progression. Mechanistically, knockdown experiments revealed that the activation of  SREBP1/2  by A1542-A1543 was responsible for induction of only a sub-set of cholesterol biosynthesis genes. Induction of other regulatory factors by A1542-A1543 including  EGR1 ,  AP1 (FOS + JUN) LDLR, IER2  and others may cooperate with  SREBP1/2  to induce cholesterol genes. Indeed, pharmacological inhibition of AP1 significantly inhibited cholesterol gene expression induced by A1542. In addition to leukemia, high expression of cholesterol biosynthesis genes was found to correlate with better prognosis in renal cancer.    Conclusions  This study demonstrates that ERK1/2 agonists suppress leukemia and possibly other types of cancer through transcriptional stimulation of cholesterol biosynthesis genes.    Supplementary Information  The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12885-021-08402-6.

ERK activation via A1542/3 limonoids attenuates erythroleukemia through transcriptional stimulation of cholesterol biosynthesis genes