Laboratory of Experimental Endocrinology, University of Crete, School of Medicine, Heraklion, Greece.
J Pharmacol Exp Ther. 2011 Apr;337(1):24-32. doi: 10.1124/jpet.110.177246. Epub 2011 Jan 4.
Prostate cancer is the most common malignancy among men in Western societies, and current therapeutic approaches are evolving to manage growth, recurrence, and mortality neoplasia. Membrane androgen receptors (mARs) have been characterized in human prostate cancer, being preferentially expressed in tumor rather than benign gland areas. Furthermore, mAR agonists (protein-conjugated testosterone) decrease in vitro prostate cancer cell growth and induce apoptosis, whereas in vivo they regress growth of tumor xenografts alone or in combination with taxane drugs. In this respect, targeting mARs might be a novel therapeutic approach in prostate cancer. In our search for new small-molecule ligands of mAR, we report that flavanol dimers B1-B4 (oligomeric procyanidins) decrease in vitro growth of the androgen-sensitive (LnCaP) and androgen-resistant (DU145) human prostate cancer cell lines in the following order: B3 = B4 > B2 ≫ B1 (LnCaP) and B2 ≫ B3 = B4 ≫ B1 (DU145). Some of these analogs were previously shown to trigger signaling cascades similar to testosterone-bovine serum albumin (BSA) conjugate. Galloylation does not confer an additional advantage; however, oleylation increases the dimers' antiproliferative potency by a factor of 100. In addition, we report that B2, oleylated or not, displaces testosterone from mARs with an IC(50) value at the nanomolar range and induces DU145 tumor xenograft regression by 50% (testosterone-BSA 40%). In this respect, oleylated B2 is a potent small-molecule agonist of mAR and could be a novel therapeutic agent for advanced prostate cancer, especially when taking into account the absence of androgenic actions and (liver) toxicity.
前列腺癌是西方社会男性中最常见的恶性肿瘤,目前的治疗方法正在不断发展,以控制肿瘤的生长、复发和死亡率。已经在人类前列腺癌中鉴定出膜雄激素受体(mAR),其优先在肿瘤而不是良性腺体区域表达。此外,mAR 激动剂(与蛋白结合的睾酮)可减少体外前列腺癌细胞的生长并诱导细胞凋亡,而在体内,它们可单独或与紫杉烷类药物联合使肿瘤异种移植物的生长消退。在这方面,靶向 mAR 可能是前列腺癌的一种新的治疗方法。在我们寻找 mAR 的新型小分子配体的过程中,我们报告称黄烷醇二聚体 B1-B4(寡聚原花青素)按以下顺序降低雄激素敏感(LnCaP)和雄激素抵抗(DU145)人前列腺癌细胞系的体外生长:B3=B4>B2≫B1(LnCaP)和 B2≫B3=B4≫B1(DU145)。其中一些类似物先前被证明可触发类似于睾酮-牛血清白蛋白(BSA)缀合物的信号级联反应。没食子酸化没有带来额外的优势;然而,油酰化将二聚体的增殖抑制效力提高了 100 倍。此外,我们报告称 B2,无论是油酰化还是非油酰化,都可以以纳摩尔范围的 IC50 值从 mAR 中置换睾酮,并使 DU145 肿瘤异种移植物消退 50%(睾酮-BSA 40%)。在这方面,油酰化的 B2 是 mAR 的有效小分子激动剂,可能是晚期前列腺癌的新型治疗剂,特别是考虑到其缺乏雄激素作用和(肝脏)毒性。