Cancerdialysis and restauration of Apoptosis signaling
Author: Sture Hobro
Cancer cells can evade apoptosis, which is the process of programmed cell death. This is one of the hallmarks of human cancers that promote tumor formation and progression as well as treatment resistance. Signals related to cancer cells metabolic rewiring contributes to the evasion of apoptosis in cancer cells by activating anti-apoptotic and cell survival programs that ultimately block cell death in cancer.
Glucose and/or glutamine deprivation can reduce cancer cells’ resistance to apoptosis. Starvation from glutamine and glucose for short periods resulted in decreased cell density, rounded cells, and apoptosis induction by means of reactive oxygen species generation and mitochondrial dysfunction.
This picture (from the article, Cancer Metabolism and the Evasion of Apoptotic Cell Death, Cancers (Basel), 2019, Aditi Sharma et al.) shows the effect from glucose and glutamine deprivation and how this leads to apoptosis (red dotted lines is added to show effect from CancerDialysis).
