Abstract
Tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) is a potent anti-cancer agent because it induces apoptosis of most tumor cells with little or no effect on normal cells. In this study, we investigated the effect of TRAIL on human prostate normal and cancer cell lines, and found that the prostate cancer cell lines PC-3, ALVA-31, DU 145 and TSU-Pr1 were sensitive to TRAIL-induced apoptosis, while normal PrEC cells and cancer cell line LNCaP were resistant. No correlation was found between the sensitivity of cells to TRAIL and the expression of TRAIL receptors DR4 and DR5, and pro-apoptotic proteins Bax and Bak. However, LNCaP cells displayed a high Akt activity. Furthermore, we found that endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS), one of the Akt substrates, was highly expressed in LNCaP but not in other cells. Inhibition of eNOS activity by NOS inhibitor sensitized LNCaP cells to TRAIL. Moreover, PC-3 cell clones stably expressing eNOS were resistant to TRAIL-induced apoptosis. Taken together, these results indicate that eNOS can regulate the sensitivity of prostate cancer cells to TRAIL, and down-regulation of eNOS activity may sensitize prostate cancer cells to TRAIL-based therapy.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 63-71 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | Cancer Letters |
| Volume | 210 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jul 8 2004 |
Funding
This work has been supported by grant DAMA17-01-1-0042 from Department of Defense (to H. L.) and the seed grant of CMIER (to H. L.). We thank Dr Stefanie Dimmeler for eNOS constructs, Dr Stephen Loop for ALVA-31 cell line and Dr Zhou Wang for various prostate cell lines and his expertise in prostate cancer research.
Keywords
- Akt
- Apoptosis
- Endothelial nitric oxide synthase
- Prostate cancer cells
- Tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Oncology
- Cancer Research
