Abstract P5-05-05: Inhibition of enhanced glucose uptake and glycolysis by KU-55933 as a novel strategy against aggressive breast cancer
Authors: Yang D-Q , Harris B , Jiang S , Li Y , Freund D , Hegeman A , Cleary M 
Published: May 2016

The ability of cancer cells to produce large amounts of lactate through aerobic glycosis (Warburg effect) is coupled to high rates of glucose uptake. Enhanced glucose uptake and glycolysis are closely correlated to increased breast tumor aggressiveness and poor prognosis. However, despite the importance of glucose uptake in supplying energy and preventing apoptosis of cancer cells, the majority of current efforts in searching for therapeutic agents targeting glucose metabolism have been aimed at modulating activities of different metabolic enzymes that are involved in glycolysis. Very limited studies have been done in developing novel therapeutic agents against glucose uptake in breast cancer cells.

Ataxia-telangiectasia (A-T) is a monogenic, autosomal recessive disorder characterized by cerebellar ataxia and oculocutaneous telangiectasias. The gene mutated in this disease, ATM (A-T, mutated), encodes a 370-kDa protein kinase. Although ATM is traditionally considered to be a nuclear protein that functions as a signal transducer in the cellular response to DNA damage, it is now known that ATM is also present in the cytoplasm and has important cytoplasmic functions. We previously discovered that ATM activates Akt, a main regulator of glucose uptake, by stimulating its phosphorylation at Ser473 following insulin treatment. We also found that ATM participates in insulin-mediated glucose uptake in muscle cells, and KU-55933, a specific inhibitor of ATM, strongly inhibits this process.

Recently, we found that KU-55933 inhibits cell proliferation by inducing apoptosis in MDA-MB-231, a triple-negative breast cancer cell line. We have also found that KU-55933 inhibits migration of MDA-MB-231 by a cell invasion assay. Furthermore, we found that these cancer cells exhibit enhanced glucose uptake in response to insulin and the addition of KU-55933 leads to a dramatic reduction of insulin-mediated glucose uptake in these cells. To further test whether KU-55933's ability to induce apoptosis is linked to its inhibition of glucose uptake, we performed a cell death ELISA assay in MDA-MB-231 cells treated with KU-55933 and different concentrations of glucose. Our results show that KU-55933 induces apoptosis of MDA-MB-231 cells, resulting in a similar degree of cell death as glucose starvation, while cells treated with glucose in conjunction with KU-55933 have decreased apoptosis. Moreover, we performed a cell migration assay and found that KU-55933 strongly inhibits the migration of MDA-MB-231 cells (similar to that caused by glucose starvation), which is almost fully rescued by the extra glucose supplemented in the cell culture medium. We have also established a positional isotope labeling-based targeted metabolomics method that can directly measure the conversion from glucose to lactate through glycolysis in cancer cells. Our results show strong production of lactate from glucose in MDA-MB-231 cells even under normal aerobic growth conditions, and KU-55933 strongly inhibits this process. Our findings may lead to the development of KU-55933 and its analogs as a new generation of therapeutic agents against aggressive breast cancer.

Citation Format: Yang D-Q, Harris B, Jiang S, Li Y, Freund D, Hegeman A, Cleary M. Inhibition of enhanced glucose uptake and glycolysis by KU-55933 as a novel strategy against aggressive breast cancer. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Thirty-Eighth Annual CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium: 2015 Dec 8-12; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(4 Suppl):Abstract nr P5-05-05.