Abnormal Protein Glycosylation and Activated PI3K/Akt/mTOR Pathway: Role in Bladder Cancer Prognosis and Targeted Therapeutics

PLoS One. 2015 Nov 16;10(11):e0141253. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0141253. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

Muscle invasive bladder cancer (MIBC, stage ≥T2) is generally associated with poor prognosis, constituting the second most common cause of death among genitourinary tumours. Due to high molecular heterogeneity significant variations in the natural history and disease outcome have been observed. This has also delayed the introduction of personalized therapeutics, making advanced stage bladder cancer almost an orphan disease in terms of treatment. Altered protein glycosylation translated by the expression of the sialyl-Tn antigen (STn) and its precursor Tn as well as the activation of the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway are cancer-associated events that may hold potential for patient stratification and guided therapy. Therefore, a retrospective design, 96 bladder tumours of different stages (Ta, T1-T4) was screened for STn and phosphorylated forms of Akt (pAkt), mTOR (pmTOR), S6 (pS6) and PTEN, related with the activation of the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway. In our series the expression of Tn was residual and was not linked to stage or outcome, while STn was statically higher in MIBC when compared to non-muscle invasive tumours (p = 0.001) and associated decreased cancer-specific survival (log rank p = 0.024). Conversely, PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway intermediates showed an equal distribution between non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) and MIBC and did not associate with cancer-specif survival (CSS) in any of these groups. However, the overexpression of pAKT, pmTOR and/or pS6 allowed discriminating STn-positive advanced stage bladder tumours facing worst CSS (p = 0.027). Furthermore, multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that overexpression of PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway proteins in STn+ MIBC was independently associated with approximately 6-fold risk of death by cancer (p = 0.039). Mice bearing advanced stage chemically-induced bladder tumours mimicking the histological and molecular nature of human tumours were then administrated with mTOR-pathway inhibitor sirolimus (rapamycin). This decreased the number of invasive lesions and, concomitantly, the expression of STn and also pS6, the downstream effector of the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway. In conclusion, STn was found to be marker of poor prognosis in bladder cancer and, in combination with PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway evaluation, holds potential to improve the stratification of stage disease. Animal experiments suggest that mTOR pathway inhibition could be a potential therapeutic approach for this specific subtype of MIBC.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Aged, 80 and over
  • Animals
  • Antigens, Tumor-Associated, Carbohydrate / metabolism
  • Female
  • Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic
  • Glycosylation
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Mice
  • Mice, Inbred ICR
  • Middle Aged
  • Neoplasm Staging
  • Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinases / metabolism*
  • Prognosis
  • Proportional Hazards Models
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-akt / metabolism*
  • Retrospective Studies
  • Signal Transduction*
  • TOR Serine-Threonine Kinases / metabolism*
  • Treatment Outcome
  • Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / diagnosis
  • Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / metabolism*
  • Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / mortality
  • Urinary Bladder Neoplasms / therapy*

Substances

  • Antigens, Tumor-Associated, Carbohydrate
  • sialosyl-Tn antigen
  • MTOR protein, human
  • AKT1 protein, human
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-akt
  • TOR Serine-Threonine Kinases

Grants and funding

This work was supported by Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) Postdoctoral grants SFRH/BPD/66288/2009 (José Alexandre Ferreira), SFRH/BPD/101827/2014 (Luis Lima), SFRH/BPD/85462/2012 (Rui Gil da Costa) and PhD grants SFRH/BD/103571/2014 (Elisabete Fernandes) and SFRH/BD/111242/2015 (Andreia Peixoto). FCT is co-financed by European Social Fund (ESF) under Human Potential Operation Programme (POPH) from National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF). The authors also acknowledge financial support from ICBAS-UP (Céu Costa and Sofia Pereira) and the Portuguese Association of Urology/Pfizer prize 2013. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.