Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UMLS:C0019204 (hepatocellular carcinoma)
 71,386 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

MTX cytotoxicity is not fully explained by its well-known inhibition of dihydrofolate reductase activity which leads to a decrease in the dTMP synthase reaction, since TdR kinase which converts TdR to dTMP could readily circumvent MTX action through this salvage activity. TdR kinase is of particular significance, since in various types of carcinoma cells its activity is orders of magnitude higher than that of dTMP synthase. To throw light on this problem, we tested the hypothesis that the impact of MTX treatment might in fact involve an inhibition or decrease in TdR kinase activity. Injection in rat of MTX (i.p.) decreased TdR kinase activity in a time- and dose-dependent fashion in liver (t1/2 = 46 h; IC50 = 95 mg/kg), bone marrow (t1/2 = 10 h; IC50 = 5 mg/kg) and rapidly growing transplantable hepatoma 3924A (t1/2 = 56 h; IC50 = 5 mg/kg). Injection in rat of cycloheximide (15 mg/kg, i.p.), an inhibitor of protein biosynthesis, rapidly decreased TdR kinase activity in the hepatoma (t1/2 = 3.6 h); activities of other purine and pyrimidine synthetic enzymes, dTMP synthase, IMP dehydrogenase, GMP reductase and GMP synthase, declined at a markedly slower rate (t1/2 = 11, 11.6, 12 and 22 h, respectively). MTX, by curtailing purine and pyrimidine biosynthesis, limits product of TdR kinase which is more sensitive to unopposed protein degradation than other enzymes of nucleic acid biosynthesis. TdR kinase is a newly discovered target of MTX treatment.
 ...
PMID:Methotrexate decreases thymidine kinase activity. 152 Mar 43

A study on the oncolytic activity of the L-cysteine derivative L-cysteine, ethyl ester, S-(N-methylcarbamate) monohydrochloride (NSC 303861), revealed that the drug caused complete regression of the MX-1 human mammary tumor xenograft. The compound also exhibited moderate antitumor activity against murine leukemia P388 (T/C value of 169% at a daily dose of 400 mg/kg) and against M5076 sarcoma (T/C value of 135% at a daily dose of 600 mg/kg). The drug was inactive against B16 melanoma, Lewis lung, colon 38 and CD8F1 mammary carcinomas. The compound exhibited significant cytotoxicity against hepatoma 3924A cells in culture (LC50 = 6 microM). Studies on the mechanism of action revealed that the cytotoxicity of the drug could be partially abrogated by protecting hepatoma 3924A cells in culture with L-glutamine. At 6 h after injection of the compound (400 mg/kg) into rats bearing hepatoma 3924A, the pools of L-glutamine and L-glutamate in the tumor decreased to 33% and 71%, respectively, of control levels; the drug selectively inhibited the activities of L-glutamine-requiring enzymes of purine nucleotide biosynthesis, amidophosphoribosyltransferase, FGAM synthase, and GMP synthase, to 21%, 1%, and 69%, respectively, without significantly altering the activities of pyrimidine biosynthetic enzymes, carbamoylphosphate synthase II and CTP synthase. Measurement of the nucleotide concentrations further corroborated the actions of the drug on the purine nucleotide biosynthetic enzyme activities. Drug injection (400 mg/kg) in the hepatoma 3924A-bearing rats reduced the concentrations of IMP in the tumor to 52%, those of total adenylates to 52%, those of total guanylates to 57%, and those of NAD to 73%, without significantly perturbing the pyrimidine nucleotide pools. Studies on the mechanism of action of the L-cysteine derivative suggested that the compound behaved as an L-glutamine antagonist, selectively acting on the enzymes of purine nucleotide biosynthesis.
 ...
PMID:Oncolytic activity and mechanism of action of a novel L-cysteine derivative, L-cysteine, ethyl ester, S-(N-methylcarbamate) monohydrochloride. 234 42

The molecular correlation concept proposed that IMP dehydrogenase activity should be a sensitive target of chemotherapy. This hypothesis received support from an array of evidence. IMP dehydrogenase has the lowest activity in purine biosynthesis; it is the rate-limiting enzyme in GTP production; the enzymic activity is transformation-and progression-linked; it is elevated in all examined animal and human neoplastic cells. The activity of GMP synthetase and the concentrations of GMP and dGTP were increased in cancer cells. Whereas guanine salvage has a high potential activity, the low guanine content may well curtail actual salvage capacity. Ribonucleotide reductase activity was two orders of magnitude lower than that of IMP dehydrogenase. Tiazofurin, a C-nucleoside, had marked cytotoxicity on hepatoma cells in vitro and was the first drug that as a single agent profoundly inhibited the proliferation of the subcutaneously inoculated solid hepatoma 3924A in the rat. The impact of tiazofurin administration in hepatoma cells was revealed in a cascade of biochemical alterations involving primary, secondary and tertiary targets and markers of this drug action. The primary target was IMP dehydrogenase where the active metabolite of tiazofurin, TAD, was thought to be absorbed to the NADH site of the enzyme. As a consequence, the enzymic activity declined rapidly to about 30-40% and returned to normal range by 36 to 48 hr after injection. The secondary targets and markers are the profoundly decreased pools of guanylates (GMP, GDP, GTP). Concurrently, the concentrations of IMP and PRPP were increased 8- to 15-fold. The elevated IMP pools were attributed to the de-inhibition of the AMP deaminase activity subsequent to the decline in GTP concentration. The rise in PRPP pools was attributed to the selective inhibition of GPRT and HPRT activities by the high IMP pool which did not affect APRT activity. This interpretation is supported by the 6- to 8-fold increase in the concentrations of guanine and hypoxanthine and the lack of change in the adenine pools inthe hepatomas after tiazofurin administration. The marked drop in NAD concentration which was drug dose- and time-dependent is attributed to the competition for NAD pyrophosphorylase activity by the precursors of NAD and tiazofurin monophosphate. The tertiary targets were dominated by the profound alterations in the concentrations of the dNTPs. This was characterized by a rapid and persistent drop (for 3 days) of the dGTP pool. The concentrations of dATP and dCTP also declined, but these alterations were less pronounced and the pools returned to normal after 2 days.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)
 ...
PMID:Targets and markers of selective action of tiazofurin. 242 86

The flux activities of de novo and salvage purine synthesis were compared in rat hepatoma 3924A cells in various growth phases. The initial rate assays of [14C]adenine, [14C]hypoxanthine, and [14C]guanine incorporation yielded Michaelis-Menten kinetics with Kms of 5, 7, and 7 microM, respectively. After replating plateau phase cells in lag and log phases the activity of purine de novo pathway increased 4.5- to 8-fold with a preferential rise in guanylate synthesis, whereas purine salvage activities increased only 1.6- to 2.1-fold. However, for the syntheses of IMP, AMP, and GMP, the activities of purine salvage pathways were 2- to 7-fold, 5- to 28-fold, and 2- to 32-fold higher than those of the de novo purine pathway. Treatment of cells with acivicin, an inhibitor of the activity of amidophosphoribosyltransferase, phosphoribosylformylglycinamidine synthase, and GMP synthase, inhibited the flux activities of de novo purine, adenylate, and guanylate syntheses to 37, 73, and 3% of the controls and decreased the concentration of GTP to 42%; the concentration of ATP did not change and that of 5-phosphoribosyl 1-pyrophosphate increased 3.1-fold. Under these conditions the activities of salvage synthesis from hypoxanthine and guanine were enhanced 2.5-fold. Treatment of hepatoma cells with IMP dehydrogenase inhibitors, tiazofurin, ribavirin, and 4-carbamoylimidazolium 5-olate, to block de novo guanylate synthesis accelerated the flux activity of guanine salvage pathway. The higher capacity of purine salvage pathway than that of the de novo one and the further rise of the activity in response to the drugs targeted against the de novo pathway highlight the important role salvage synthesis might play in circumventing the impact of antimetabolites of de novo purine synthesis in cancer chemotherapy.
 ...
PMID:Significance of purine salvage in circumventing the action of antimetabolites in rat hepatoma cells. 246

Evidence was provided that injection of acivicin (25 mg/kg, i.p.) into the rat inactivated brain CTP and GMP synthetases. Under the same circumstances, CTP and GTP concentrations in the rat brain decreased following the decline in the activities of CTP and GMP synthetases. The decrease in enzymic activities and nucleotide concentrations progressed with time. The decline in CTP and GMP synthetase activities and CTP and GTP concentrations caused by acivicin occurred more slowly and to a lesser extent than in liver and hepatoma 3924A. The delay in the expression of acivicin action in the rat brain was attributed to a possible slower entrance of acivicin and the lower concentration than might have been attained in the rat brain. These considerations are based on the rapid disappearance of acivicin from rat plasma noted earlier. The decline in CTP concentration in rat brain might interfere with neuronal function. The decline in GTP concentration might be expressed through the depletion of biopterins which are generated from GTP in the brain. The possible relevance to the biochemical basis of paranoid schizophrenia which occurs reversibly after high-dose acivicin or tiazofurin treatment was discussed.
 ...
PMID:Inactivation by acivicin of rat brain CTP and GMP synthetases and depression of CTP and GTP concentrations. 383 20

The behavior of the activities of GMP synthetase (xanthosine-5'-phosphate: L-glutamine amino-ligase(AMP-forming),EC 6.3.5.2) and GMP kinase (ATP: (d)GMP phosphotransferase,EC 2.7.4.8) was elucidated in cytosol preparations of rat tissues, including fetal, neonatal and regenerating liver, in a transplantable kidney tumor, and in a spectrum of 11 hepatomas of different growth rates. GMP kinase activity was 60-fold or more higher than GMP synthetase activity in all of the examined tissues. GMP synthetase activity was increased in all hepatomas and in the kidney tumor, compared to control tissues, reaching 5.5-fold the normal liver values in the most rapidly growing hepatoma. This increase correlated with the tumor growth rates. GMP kinase activity showed no consistent pattern of alteration in the tumors. In both fetal and neonatal rat liver the activity of GMP synthetase was 2.5-times higher than in livers of adult rats, but GMP kinase activity did not change markedly during liver development. After partial hepatectomy GMP synthetase activity was elevated, reaching a peak of 155% of the sham-operated control values by 36 h after the operation. GMP kinase activity was not affected by partial hepatectomy. After 3 days starvation hepatic GMP kinase activity decreased slightly faster than total cytosol protein, while GMP synthetase activity was preferentially maintained. These results indicate that GMP synthetase activity was linked with cellular proliferation in differentiating, regenerating and neoplastic tissues.
 ...
PMID:Guanosine-5'-phosphate synthetase and guanosine-5'-phosphate kinase in rat hepatomas and kidney tumors. 626 Feb 5

The antiglutamine agent acivicin, L-(alpha S,5S)-alpha-amino-3-chloro-4,5-dihydro-5-isoxazoleacetic acid, inhibited the growth of hepatoma 3924A cells in culture. After 7 days of incubation with the drug, an LC50 of 1.4 microM was observed by determination of colony forming ability. A combination of cytidine (1 mM), deoxycytidine (10 microM) and guanosine (10 microM) completely protected the hepatoma cells against the cytotoxic action of acivicin, but each nucleoside by itself had no effect. Acivicin (0.1 mM) inhibited the incorporation of uridine and thymidine into macromolecules, but not that of leucine. Acivicin depressed the pools of CTP, GTP, dCTP, dGTP and dTTP to 46, 62, 40, 64 and 53%, respectively, but it increased UTP level to 152% of the values of untreated cancer cells. The activity of a highly purified CTP synthetase (EC 6.3.4.2) from rat liver and hepatoma 3924A was inhibited by acivicin. The inhibition was competitive with respect to L-glutamine, and the Ki values with liver and hepatoma enzymes, determined by Dixon and reciprocal plots, were 1.1 and 3.6 microM respectively. The hydroxy analog of acivicin was also a competitive inhibitor, but it was less effective than acivicin, with a Ki value of 1.8 mM for the hepatoma enzyme. Our observations on the impact of acivicin on the behavior of pools of ribonucleotides and deoxyribonucleotides and the competitive inhibition of purified CTP synthetase from hepatoma cells suggest that a major mechanism of action for this drug is the inhibition of CTP synthetase and GMP synthetase (EC 6.3.5.2).
 ...
PMID:Biochemical pharmacology of acivicin in rat hepatoma cells. 715 Mar 66