1. Inhibition of WNT signaling attenuates self-renewal of SHH-subgroup medulloblastoma
- Author
-
Rodriguez-Blanco, J, Pednekar, L, Penas, C, Li, B, Martin, V, Long, J, Lee, E, Weiss, WA, Rodriguez, C, Mehrdad, N, Nguyen, DM, Ayad, NG, Rai, P, Capobianco, AJ, and Robbins, DJ
- Subjects
Biomedical and Clinical Sciences ,Clinical Sciences ,Oncology and Carcinogenesis ,Cancer ,Rare Diseases ,Brain Disorders ,Pediatric ,Brain Cancer ,Neurosciences ,Pediatric Cancer ,Stem Cell Research ,5.1 Pharmaceuticals ,Development of treatments and therapeutic interventions ,Anilides ,Animals ,Cell Line ,Tumor ,Cerebellar Neoplasms ,Disease Models ,Animal ,HEK293 Cells ,Hedgehog Proteins ,Humans ,Male ,Medulloblastoma ,Mice ,Mice ,Transgenic ,Pyridines ,Random Allocation ,SOXB1 Transcription Factors ,Small Molecule Libraries ,TRPC Cation Channels ,Transfection ,Tumor Suppressor Protein p53 ,Veratrum Alkaloids ,Wnt Proteins ,Wnt Signaling Pathway ,Oncology & Carcinogenesis ,Biochemistry and cell biology ,Oncology and carcinogenesis - Abstract
The SMOOTHENED inhibitor vismodegib is FDA approved for advanced basal cell carcinoma (BCC), and shows promise in clinical trials for SONIC HEDGEHOG (SHH)-subgroup medulloblastoma (MB) patients. Clinical experience with BCC patients shows that continuous exposure to vismodegib is necessary to prevent tumor recurrence, suggesting the existence of a vismodegib-resistant reservoir of tumor-propagating cells. We isolated such tumor-propagating cells from a mouse model of SHH-subgroup MB and grew them as sphere cultures. These cultures were enriched for the MB progenitor marker SOX2 and formed tumors in vivo. Moreover, while their ability to self-renew was resistant to SHH inhibitors, as has been previously suggested, this self-renewal was instead WNT-dependent. We show here that loss of Trp53 activates canonical WNT signaling in these SOX2-enriched cultures. Importantly, a small molecule WNT inhibitor was able to reduce the propagation and growth of SHH-subgroup MB in vivo, in an on-target manner, leading to increased survival. Our results imply that the tumor-propagating cells driving the growth of bulk SHH-dependent MB are themselves WNT dependent. Further, our data suggest combination therapy with WNT and SHH inhibitors as a therapeutic strategy in patients with SHH-subgroup MB, in order to decrease the tumor recurrence commonly observed in patients treated with vismodegib.
- Published
- 2017