Cited by 79Cancer, Hypoxia, and MetabolismSulfur Compounds in BiologyMetabolism, Diabetes, and Cancer

Disrupting Mitochondrial Pyruvate Uptake Directs Glutamine into the TCA Cycle away from Glutathione Synthesis and Impairs Hepatocellular Tumorigenesis

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Tompkins, Sean C., Sheldon, Ryan D., Rauckhorst, Adam J., Noterman, Maria F., Solst, Shane R., Buchanan, Jane L., Mapuskar, Kranti A., Pewa, Alvin D. +7 more·2019·Cell Reports

Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a devastating cancer increasingly caused by non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Disrupting the liver Mitochondrial Pyruvate Carrier (MPC) in mice attenuates NAFLD. Thus, we considered whether liver MPC disruption also prevents HCC. Here, we use the N-nitrosodiethylamine plus carbon tetrachloride model of HCC development to test how liver-specific MPC knock out affects hepatocellular tumorigenesis. Our data show that liver MPC ablation markedly decreases tumorigenesis and that MPC-deficient tumors transcriptomically downregulate glutathione metabolism. We observe that MPC disruption and glutathione depletion in cultured hepatomas are synthetically lethal. Stable isotope tracing shows that hepatocyte MPC disruption reroutes glutamine from glutathione synthesis into the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle. These results support a model where inducing metabolic competition for glutamine by MPC disruption impairs hepatocellular tumorigenesis by limiting glutathione synthesis. These findings raise the possibility that combining MPC disruption and glutathione stress may be therapeutically useful in HCC and additional cancers.

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  • Experiments using uniformly labeled 13C-glutamine showed that glutathione was enriched with five 13C atoms, suggesting that glutamine is the major source of glutathione.

    “Indeed, experiments using uniformly labeled 13C-glutamine showed that glutathione was enriched with five 13C atoms in glutathione, suggesting that glutamine is the major source of glutathione16,57,60.”

    From Glutamine reliance in cell metabolism (2020) · cites this paper as [60]

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Authors
Tompkins, S. C., Sheldon, R. D., Rauckhorst, A. J., Noterman, M. F., Solst, S. R., Buchanan, J. L., Mapuskar, K. A., Pewa, A. D., Gray, L. R., Oonthonpan, L., Sharma, A., Scerbo, D. A., Dupuy, A. J., Spitz, D. R., & Taylor, E. B.
Affiliations
University of Iowa (US)
Corresponding author
Taylor, Eric B.
Venue
Cell Reports
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2019-09
Volume
28
Issue
10
Pages
2608-2619.e6
ISSN
2211-1247 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2972083076
Cited by
79
References
57
Citations by year
2026: 4 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 14 · 2020: 17
FWCI
3.56
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Cell Reports (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
  • National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
  • National Institute of General Medical Sciences
  • American Diabetes Association
  • National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
  • National Cancer Institute
  • National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Cancer Research › Cancer, Hypoxia, and Metabolism
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Biochemistry › Sulfur Compounds in Biology
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Metabolism, Diabetes, and Cancer
Keywords
mitochondrial pyruvate carrier, hepatocellular carcinoma, glutathione synthesis, glutamine metabolism, TCA cycle, metabolic competition, synthetic lethality, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, glutathione depletion, liver-specific knockout
MeSH terms
Animals, Citric Acid Cycle, Glutamine, Glutathione, Carcinoma, Hepatocellular, Humans, Liver Neoplasms, Mice, Inbred C57BL, Mitochondria, Neoplasm Proteins, Organ Specificity, Apoptosis, Pyruvic Acid, Hepatocytes, Cell Line, Tumor, Transcriptome, Carcinogenesis

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