ARAP1 negatively regulates stress fibers formation and metastasis in lung adenocarcinoma via controlling Rho signaling

Small GTPases regulate multiple important cellular behaviors and their activities are strictly controlled by a mass of regulators. The dysfunction or abnormal expression of small GTPases or their regulators was frequently observed in various cancers. Here, we analyzed the expression and prognostic correlation of several GTPases and related regulators based on the TCGA database and found that Ankyrin Repeat and PH Domain 1 (ARAP1), a GTPase activating protein (GAP), is reduced in lung adenocarcinoma tissues compared to normal tissues and displays a positive correlation with overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) of patients with lung adenocarcinoma. qPCR and western blot verified that ARAP1 is frequently downregulated in lung adenocarcinoma tumor tissues and cancer cells, and its downregulation might be mediated by epigenetic modification. Moreover, metastatic assays showed that overexpression of ARAP1 significantly inhibits metastasis of lung adenocarcinoma in vitro and in vivo. We further demonstrated that Rho signaling inhibition, mediated by RhoGAP activity of ARAP1, majorly contributes to suppressing migration and invasion of lung adenocarcinoma cancer cells via inhibiting stress fibers formation. In summary, this study indicates that ARAP1 may serve as a potential prognostic predictor and a metastatic suppressor in lung adenocarcinoma via its RhoGAP activity. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12672-023-00832-x.