ISSN: 1837-9664Journal of Cancer
Global reach, higher impact
J Cancer 2021; 12(22):6727-6739. doi:10.7150/jca.60208 This issue Cite
Research Paper
Metformin exerts a synergistic effect with venetoclax by downregulating Mcl-1 protein in acute myeloid leukemia
1. Department of Clinical Pharmacology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, 87 Xiangya Road, Changsha 410008, PR China.
2. Institute of Clinical Pharmacology, Central South University, Hunan Key Laboratory of Pharmacogenetics, 110 Xiangya Road, Changsha 410078, PR China.
3. Engineering Research Center of Applied Technology of Pharmacogenomics, Ministry of Education, 110 Xiangya Road, Changsha 410078, PR China.
4. National Clinical Research Center for Geriatric Disorders, 87 Xiangya Road, Changsha 410008, Hunan, PR China.
5. Phase I Clinical Trial Research Center, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, 87 Xiangya Road, Changsha 410008, Hunan, P.R. China.
Abstract
Background: Recently, one of the specific BH3-mimetics, Venetoclax has been approved by FDA providing new options for newly diagnosed AML patient especially who are unfitted to receive conventional chemotherapy. Though the clinical success of venetoclax has been achieved in clinical outcomes such as complete remission (CR) and overall survival. Acquired resistance to ABT-199 which is induced by the regulation of apoptosis pathway is still an important clinical problem. To this end, the attempt to combine drugs which can reverse the compensatory regulation is urgent.
Methods: In three AML cell lines (KG-1, Kasumi-1 and THP-1), the anti-AML effects of the combination of ABT-199 (Venetoclax) and metformin or the two drugs used alone were compared. CCK8 was used to evaluate the cell viability, and flow cytometry was used to estimate the rate of apoptosis, Western blot method was performed to detect apoptosis-related protein levels. In mice experiments, female BALB/c-nu nude mice were subcutaneously injected with THP-1 cells for subcutaneous tumor formation, and the combined effect of ABT-199 and metformin was tested. The evaluation indicators were tumor size, tumor weight, and Ki67 staining. Mouse body weight and HE staining were detected to evaluate liver damage and adverse drug reactions.
Results: Both in vitro and in vivo experiments showed that compared with metformin or ABT-199 alone, the combined use of the two drugs exerts a synergistic effect on promoting apoptosis, thereby producing a strong anti-leukemia effect. Furthermore, after a short incubation time, ABT-199 swiftly increased the expression level of the anti-apoptotic protein Mcl-1, while the combined use of metformin and ABT-199 significantly reduced the level of Mcl-1. Notably, Metformin significantly downregulates the level of Mcl-1 protein by inhibiting its protein production. To less extent, metformin can also downregulate the expression of another anti-apoptotic protein, BCL-xl.
Conclusion: Metformin downregulates the expression of anti-apoptotic proteins Mcl-1 and Bcl-xl by inhibiting protein production, and shows a synergistic anti-tumor effect with ABT-199 in acute myeloid leukemia.
Keywords: AML, ABT-199, Metformin, Mcl-1, Synergistic anti-tumor effect
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