Flipping the switch on angiogenesis
The angiogenic switch, in which tumors begin recruiting blood vessels to amplify blood supply, is an important step in tumor progression, but the molecular mechanisms that initiate this step are not well defined. Sampurna Chatterjee and colleagues identified an autocrine feed-forward loop wherein tumor cells secrete the pro-angiogenic factor VEGF to stimulate their own pro-angiogenic cell surface receptors (VEGFR2). Disruption of this feed-forward loop was sufficient to prevent tumor growth in a mouse model of lung cancer. This auto-stimulatory angiogenic loop was also active in human lung tumors. The image on the left is a cartoon of a tumor secreting VEGF (yellow) to stimulate pro-angiogenic receptors (VEGFR2, blue). Right: Full body scans of mice bearing fluorescent tumor xenografts. (All images provided by the authors.)
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Abstract
The molecular mechanisms that control the balance between antiangiogenic and proangiogenic factors and initiate the angiogenic switch in tumors remain poorly defined. By combining chemical genetics with multimodal imaging, we have identified an autocrine feed-forward loop in tumor cells in which tumor-derived VEGF stimulates VEGF production via VEGFR2-dependent activation of mTOR, substantially amplifying the initial proangiogenic signal. Disruption of this feed-forward loop by chemical perturbation or knockdown of VEGFR2 in tumor cells dramatically inhibited production of VEGF in vitro and in vivo. This disruption was sufficient to prevent tumor growth in vivo. In patients with lung cancer, we found that this VEGF:VEGFR2 feed-forward loop was active, as the level of VEGF/VEGFR2 binding in tumor cells was highly correlated to tumor angiogenesis. We further demonstrated that inhibition of tumor cell VEGFR2 induces feedback activation of the IRS/MAPK signaling cascade. Most strikingly, combined pharmacological inhibition of VEGFR2 (ZD6474) and MEK (PD0325901) in tumor cells resulted in dramatic tumor shrinkage, whereas monotherapy only modestly slowed tumor growth. Thus, a tumor cell-autonomous VEGF:VEGFR2 feed-forward loop provides signal amplification required for the establishment of fully angiogenic tumors in lung cancer. Interrupting this feed-forward loop switches tumor cells from an angiogenic to a proliferative phenotype that sensitizes tumor cells to MAPK inhibition.
Authors
Sampurna Chatterjee, Lukas C. Heukamp, Maike Siobal, Jakob Schöttle, Caroline Wieczorek, Martin Peifer, Davide Frasca, Mirjam Koker, Katharina König, Lydia Meder, Daniel Rauh, Reinhard Buettner, Jürgen Wolf, Rolf A. Brekken, Bernd Neumaier, Gerhard Christofori, Roman K. Thomas, Roland T. Ullrich
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ISSN: 0021-9738 (print), 1558-8238 (online)