Publication Date:
2011-03-25
Description:
Melanoma is a tumour of transformed melanocytes, which are originally derived from the embryonic neural crest. It is unknown to what extent the programs that regulate neural crest development interact with mutations in the BRAF oncogene, which is the most commonly mutated gene in human melanoma. We have used zebrafish embryos to identify the initiating transcriptional events that occur on activation of human BRAF(V600E) (which encodes an amino acid substitution mutant of BRAF) in the neural crest lineage. Zebrafish embryos that are transgenic for mitfa:BRAF(V600E) and lack p53 (also known as tp53) have a gene signature that is enriched for markers of multipotent neural crest cells, and neural crest progenitors from these embryos fail to terminally differentiate. To determine whether these early transcriptional events are important for melanoma pathogenesis, we performed a chemical genetic screen to identify small-molecule suppressors of the neural crest lineage, which were then tested for their effects on melanoma. One class of compound, inhibitors of dihydroorotate dehydrogenase (DHODH), for example leflunomide, led to an almost complete abrogation of neural crest development in zebrafish and to a reduction in the self-renewal of mammalian neural crest stem cells. Leflunomide exerts these effects by inhibiting the transcriptional elongation of genes that are required for neural crest development and melanoma growth. When used alone or in combination with a specific inhibitor of the BRAF(V600E) oncogene, DHODH inhibition led to a marked decrease in melanoma growth both in vitro and in mouse xenograft studies. Taken together, these studies highlight developmental pathways in neural crest cells that have a direct bearing on melanoma formation.〈br /〉〈br /〉〈a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3759979/" target="_blank"〉〈img src="https://static.pubmed.gov/portal/portal3rc.fcgi/4089621/img/3977009" border="0"〉〈/a〉 〈a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3759979/" target="_blank"〉This paper as free author manuscript - peer-reviewed and accepted for publication〈/a〉〈br /〉〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉White, Richard Mark -- Cech, Jennifer -- Ratanasirintrawoot, Sutheera -- Lin, Charles Y -- Rahl, Peter B -- Burke, Christopher J -- Langdon, Erin -- Tomlinson, Matthew L -- Mosher, Jack -- Kaufman, Charles -- Chen, Frank -- Long, Hannah K -- Kramer, Martin -- Datta, Sumon -- Neuberg, Donna -- Granter, Scott -- Young, Richard A -- Morrison, Sean -- Wheeler, Grant N -- Zon, Leonard I -- K08 AR055368/AR/NIAMS NIH HHS/ -- R01 CA103846/CA/NCI NIH HHS/ -- R01 HG002668/HG/NHGRI NIH HHS/ -- R01 HG002668-08/HG/NHGRI NIH HHS/ -- T32 CA009172/CA/NCI NIH HHS/ -- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council/United Kingdom -- Howard Hughes Medical Institute/ -- England -- Nature. 2011 Mar 24;471(7339):518-22. doi: 10.1038/nature09882.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Stem Cell Program and Hematology/Oncology, Children's Hospital Boston, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21430780" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Amino Acid Substitution
;
Animals
;
Animals, Genetically Modified
;
Cell Differentiation/drug effects
;
Cell Line, Tumor
;
Cell Lineage/drug effects
;
Disease Models, Animal
;
Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic
;
Genes, p53/genetics
;
Humans
;
Isoxazoles/pharmacology/therapeutic use
;
Melanoma/drug therapy/enzymology/*genetics/*pathology
;
Mice
;
Neural Crest/drug effects/*enzymology/metabolism/pathology
;
Oxidoreductases Acting on CH-CH Group Donors/antagonists & inhibitors/*metabolism
;
Proto-Oncogene Proteins B-raf/antagonists &
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inhibitors/chemistry/genetics/metabolism
;
Rats
;
Stem Cells/cytology/drug effects/pathology
;
*Transcription, Genetic/drug effects/physiology
;
Xenograft Model Antitumor Assays
;
Zebrafish/embryology/genetics
Print ISSN:
0028-0836
Electronic ISSN:
1476-4687
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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