Defective Regulation of Autophagy upon Leucine Deprivation Reveals a Targetable Liability of Human Melanoma Cells In Vitro and In Vivo

Autophagy is of increasing interest as a target for cancer therapy. We find that leucine deprivation causes the caspase-dependent apoptotic death of melanoma cells because it fails to appropriately activate autophagy. Hyperactivation of the RAS-MEK pathway, which is common in melanoma, prevents leuc...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Sheen, Joon-Ho (Author), Zoncu, Roberto (Author), Kim, Dohoon (Author), Sabatini, David M (Author), Sabatini, David (Author)
Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology (Contributor), Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research (Contributor), Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT (Contributor), Sabatini, David M. (Contributor)
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier, 2014-12-10T17:10:53Z.
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Online Access:Get fulltext
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100 1 0 |a Sheen, Joon-Ho  |e author 
100 1 0 |a Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biology  |e contributor 
100 1 0 |a Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research  |e contributor 
100 1 0 |a Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT  |e contributor 
100 1 0 |a Sabatini, David M.  |e contributor 
700 1 0 |a Zoncu, Roberto  |e author 
700 1 0 |a Kim, Dohoon  |e author 
700 1 0 |a Sabatini, David M.  |e author 
700 1 0 |a Sabatini, David  |e author 
245 0 0 |a Defective Regulation of Autophagy upon Leucine Deprivation Reveals a Targetable Liability of Human Melanoma Cells In Vitro and In Vivo 
260 |b Elsevier,   |c 2014-12-10T17:10:53Z. 
856 |z Get fulltext  |u http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/92254 
520 |a Autophagy is of increasing interest as a target for cancer therapy. We find that leucine deprivation causes the caspase-dependent apoptotic death of melanoma cells because it fails to appropriately activate autophagy. Hyperactivation of the RAS-MEK pathway, which is common in melanoma, prevents leucine deprivation from inhibiting mTORC1, the main repressor of autophagy under nutrient-rich conditions. In an in vivo tumor xenograft model, the combination of a leucine-free diet and an autophagy inhibitor synergistically suppresses the growth of human melanoma tumors and triggers widespread apoptosis of the cancer cells. Together, our study represents proof of principle that anticancer effects can be obtained with a combination of autophagy inhibition and strategies to deprive tumors of leucine. 
520 |a National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant R01 CA103866) 
520 |a National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant CA1299105) 
546 |a en_US 
655 7 |a Article 
773 |t Cancer Cell