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Resveratrol suppresses growth of cancer stem-like cells by inhibiting fatty acid synthase

  • Preclinical Study
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Abstract

Resveratrol is a natural polyphenolic compound and has been shown to exhibit cardio-protective as well as anti-neoplastic effects on various types of cancers. However, the exact mechanism of its anti-tumor effect is not clearly defined. Resveratrol has been shown to have strong hypolipidemic effect on normal adipocytes and as hyper-lipogenesis is a hallmark of cancer cell physiology, the effect of resveratrol on lipid synthesis in cancer stem-like cells (CD24−/CD44+/ESA+) that were isolated from both ER+ and ER− breast cancer cell lines was examined. The authors found that resveratrol significantly reduced the cell viability and mammosphere formation followed by inducing apoptosis in cancer stem-like cells. This inhibitory effect of resveratrol is accompanied by a significant reduction in lipid synthesis which is caused by the down-regulation of the fatty acid synthase (FAS) gene followed by up-regulation of pro-apoptotic genes, DAPK2 and BNIP3. The activation of apoptotic pathway in the cancer stem-like cells was suppressed by TOFA and by Fumonisin B1, suggesting that resveratrol-induced apoptosis is indeed through the modulation of FAS-mediated cell survival signaling. Importantly, resveratrol was able to significantly suppress the growth of cancer stem-like cells in an animal model of xenograft without showing apparental toxicity. Taken together, the results of this study indicate that resveratrol is capable of inducing apoptosis in the cancer stem-like cells through suppression of lipogenesis by modulating FAS expression, which highlights a novel mechanism of anti-tumor effect of resveratrol.

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Abbreviations

FAS:

Fatty acid synthase

ER+:

Estrogen receptor positive

ER−:

Estrogen receptor negative

DAPK2:

Death associated kinase 2

BNIP3:

BCL2/adenovirus E1B 19 kDa protein-interacting protein 3

TRAIL:

Tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand

ACC:

Acetyl-CoA carboxylase

TOFA:

5-(Tetradecyloxy)-2-furoic acid

qRT-PCR:

Quantitative real-time PCR

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the National Institutes of Health [R01CA124650 and R01CA129000], the Department of Defense, and Susan G. Komen Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medical Microbiology, Immunology & Cell Biology, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, 801 N. Rutledge St., P.O. Box 19626, Springfield, IL, 62794-9626, USA

    Puspa R. Pandey, Hiroshi Okuda, Misako Watabe, Sudha K. Pai, Wen Liu, Aya Kobayashi, Fei Xing, Koji Fukuda, Yin-Yuan Mo, Deliang Cao & Kounosuke Watabe

  2. Iwate Medical University, School of Medicine, Morioka, Japan

    Shigeru Hirota, Tamotsu Sugai, Go Wakabayashi, Keisuke Koeda, Masahiro Kashiwaba, Kazuyuki Suzuki, Toshimi Chiba, Masaki Endo, Tomoaki Fujioka & Susumu Tanji

  3. Department of Surgery, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, Springfield, IL, USA

    Andrew C. Wilber

Authors
  1. Puspa R. Pandey
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  2. Hiroshi Okuda
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  22. Kounosuke Watabe
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Correspondence to Kounosuke Watabe.

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Pandey, P.R., Okuda, H., Watabe, M. et al. Resveratrol suppresses growth of cancer stem-like cells by inhibiting fatty acid synthase. Breast Cancer Res Treat 130, 387–398 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10549-010-1300-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10549-010-1300-6

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