TY  - JOUR
A1  - Peck, Barrie
A1  - Schug, Zachary T.
A1  - Zhang, Qifeng
A1  - Dankworth, Beatrice
A1  - Jones, Dylan T.
A1  - Smethurst, Elizabeth
A1  - Patel, Rachana
A1  - Mason, Susan
A1  - Jian, Ming
A1  - Saunders, Rebecca
A1  - Howell, Michael
A1  - Mitter, Richard
A1  - Spencer-Dene, Bradley
A1  - Stamp, Gordon
A1  - McGarry, Lynn
A1  - James, Daniel
A1  - Shanks, Emma
A1  - Aboagye, Eric O.
A1  - Critchlow, Susan E.
A1  - Leung, Hing Y.
A1  - Harris, Adrian L.
A1  - Wakelam, Michael J. O.
A1  - Gottlieb, Eyal
A1  - Schulze, Almut
T1  - Inhibition of fatty acid desaturation is detrimental to cancer cell survival in metabolically compromised environments
JF  - Cancer & Metabolism
N2  - Background
Enhanced macromolecule biosynthesis is integral to growth and proliferation of cancer cells. Lipid biosynthesis has been predicted to be an essential process in cancer cells. However, it is unclear which enzymes within this pathway offer the best selectivity for cancer cells and could be suitable therapeutic targets.

Results
Using functional genomics, we identified stearoyl-CoA desaturase (SCD), an enzyme that controls synthesis of unsaturated fatty acids, as essential in breast and prostate cancer cells. SCD inhibition altered cellular lipid composition and impeded cell viability in the absence of exogenous lipids. SCD inhibition also altered cardiolipin composition, leading to the release of cytochrome C and induction of apoptosis. Furthermore, SCD was required for the generation of poly-unsaturated lipids in cancer cells grown in spheroid cultures, which resemble those found in tumour tissue. We also found that SCD mRNA and protein expression is elevated in human breast cancers and predicts poor survival in high-grade tumours. Finally, silencing of SCD in prostate orthografts efficiently blocked tumour growth and significantly increased animal survival.

Conclusions
Our data implicate lipid desaturation as an essential process for cancer cell survival and suggest that targeting SCD could efficiently limit tumour expansion, especially under the metabolically compromised conditions of the tumour microenvironment.
KW  - SCD
KW  - lipidomics
KW  - prostate cancer
KW  - breast cancer
KW  - lipid desaturation
Y1  - 2016
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-145905
VL  - 4
IS  - 6
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Gatto, Francesco
A1  - Schulze, Almut
A1  - Nielsen, Jens
T1  - Systematic Analysis Reveals that Cancer Mutations Converge on Deregulated Metabolism of Arachidonate and Xenobiotics
JF  - Cell Reports
N2  - Mutations are the basis of the clonal evolution of most cancers. Nevertheless, a systematic analysis of whether mutations are selected in cancer because they lead to the deregulation of specific biological processes independent of the type of cancer is still lacking. In this study, we correlated the genome and transcriptome of 1,082 tumors. We found that nine commonly mutated genes correlated with substantial changes in gene expression, which primarily converged on metabolism. Further network analyses circumscribed the convergence to a network of reactions, termed AraX, that involves the glutathione- and oxygen-mediated metabolism of arachidonic acid and xenobiotics. In an independent cohort of 4,462 samples, all nine mutated genes were consistently correlated with the deregulation of AraX. Among all of the metabolic pathways, AraX deregulation represented the strongest predictor of patient survival. These findings suggest that oncogenic mutations drive a selection process that converges on the deregulation of the AraX network.
KW  - Cancer genetics
KW  - Genetics research
Y1  - 2016
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-164814
VL  - 16
IS  - 3
ER  -