The overall survival for patients diagnosed with advanced or metastatic cancers has changed little despite the development of novel targeted therapeutics. The basis of most cancer care remains cytotoxic therapy - radiation and chemotherapy - that kills rapidly proliferating cells. Current drug development continues to screen for agents under permissive growth conditions with readouts that are surrogates for proliferation. However, these strategies provide only incremental improvements as in vivo microenvironmental tumor conditions and the complex cellular involvement promote heterogeneity within the tumor through genetic and non-genetic variations associated with therapeutic resistance, angiogenesis, and tumor progression. Multiple approaches are under development to improve the identification of druggable targets within these critical tumor cell variants. We and others are investigating one source of tumor heterogeneity - the differentiation hierarchy incorporated within the cancer stem cell hypothesis. We believe that the cancer stem cell phenotype is plastic and defined by both cell autonomous and external cues so high throughput analyses, although reported, may not fully represent the cancer stem cell state. We have previously demonstrated that brain tumor stem cells are resistant to radiation and also promote tumor angiogenesis. Based on this background, we hypothesize that inhibiting key survival pathways active in brain tumor stem cells but not normal tissue stem cells will augment the efficacy of current brain tumor therapies. Specifically, we propose to: 1. Evaluate the anti-angiogenic capacity of a novel brain tumor stem cell targeting agent. 2. Determine the therapeutic efficacy of a novel brain tumor stem cell targeting agent in combination with bevacizumab. 3. Determine the therapeutic efficacy of a novel brain tumor stem cell targeting agent in combination with radiation and chemotherapy. We hope that these studies will lay the foundation for direct translation into therapeutic trials.

Public Health Relevance

Glioblastomas are among the deadliest of all human cancers despite treatment with radiation, chemotherapy, and - most recently - drugs that block new blood vessel growth to feed tumors. Within glioblastomas, cells called cancer stem cells have been found that in laboratory studies are resistant to radiotherapy and chemotherapy and also stimulate new blood vessels to grow. We will test ways of attacking the cancer stem cells to sensitize them to the effects of current brain cancer treatments.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
1R01CA154130-01
Application #
8010135
Study Section
Developmental Therapeutics Study Section (DT)
Program Officer
Arya, Suresh
Project Start
2010-07-01
Project End
2014-12-31
Budget Start
2010-07-01
Budget End
2010-12-31
Support Year
1
Fiscal Year
2010
Total Cost
$211,920
Indirect Cost
Name
Cleveland Clinic Lerner
Department
Other Basic Sciences
Type
Schools of Medicine
DUNS #
135781701
City
Cleveland
State
OH
Country
United States
Zip Code
44195
Mack, Stephen C; Pajtler, Kristian W; Chavez, Lukas et al. (2018) Therapeutic targeting of ependymoma as informed by oncogenic enhancer profiling. Nature 553:101-105
Wang, Xiuxing; Prager, Briana C; Wu, Qiulian et al. (2018) Reciprocal Signaling between Glioblastoma Stem Cells and Differentiated Tumor Cells Promotes Malignant Progression. Cell Stem Cell 22:514-528.e5
Zhu, Zhe; Gorman, Matthew J; McKenzie, Lisa D et al. (2017) Zika virus has oncolytic activity against glioblastoma stem cells. J Exp Med 214:2843-2857
Wang, Xiuxing; Yang, Kailin; Xie, Qi et al. (2017) Purine synthesis promotes maintenance of brain tumor initiating cells in glioma. Nat Neurosci 20:661-673
Wang, Xiuxing; Huang, Zhi; Wu, Qiulian et al. (2017) MYC-Regulated Mevalonate Metabolism Maintains Brain Tumor-Initiating Cells. Cancer Res 77:4947-4960
Miller, Tyler E; Liau, Brian B; Wallace, Lisa C et al. (2017) Transcription elongation factors represent in vivo cancer dependencies in glioblastoma. Nature 547:355-359
Jin, Xun; Kim, Leo J Y; Wu, Qiulian et al. (2017) Targeting glioma stem cells through combined BMI1 and EZH2 inhibition. Nat Med 23:1352-1361
Xie, Qi; Wu, Qiulian; Kim, Leo et al. (2016) RBPJ maintains brain tumor-initiating cells through CDK9-mediated transcriptional elongation. J Clin Invest 126:2757-72
Alvarado, Alvaro G; Turaga, Soumya M; Sathyan, Pratheesh et al. (2016) Coordination of self-renewal in glioblastoma by integration of adhesion and microRNA signaling. Neuro Oncol 18:656-66
Dermawan, Josephine Kam Tai; Hitomi, Masahiro; Silver, Daniel J et al. (2016) Pharmacological Targeting of the Histone Chaperone Complex FACT Preferentially Eliminates Glioblastoma Stem Cells and Prolongs Survival in Preclinical Models. Cancer Res 76:2432-42

Showing the most recent 10 out of 55 publications