At this week’s Keystone Symposia “New Frontiers in Understanding Tumor Metabolism” joint with “Immunometabolism in Immune Function and Inflammatory Disease”, taking place in the dramatic mountain panorama of Banff National Park in Canada, almost 600 researchers have come together to present and discuss their newest data. Certainly, there is a common theme of metabolism to all these talks and posters, so rushing from one session to the other is very much the thing to do here. HypOxygen is at the conference (poster exhibit hall Q7) exhibiting the Don Whitley Scientific HypOxystation for low oxygen cell culture.
Right opposite our instrumentation, Kate Hollinshead of the University of Birmingham in the UK presented her poster entitled “IDH1 mutated cells demonstrate pseudohypoxic proline metabolism”. There were a number of other posters giving insights into the significance of hypoxia for cellular metabolism and signaling, also: maintenance of lipid homeostasis in hypoxic tumor regions (Daniel Ackerman); increasing radiosensitivity by alleviating tumor hypoxia (Thomas Ashton); screening for substances targeting the hypoxic core in tumors (Sven Christian). Basically everyone who has stopped by to have a closer look at the HypOxystation has expressed quite emphatically that research into solid tumors has to take the hypoxic conditions prevailing there into account, as oxygen levels closer to 1% can be considered normoxic for the tumor microenvironment. The HypOxystation provides a tool to investigate cells at physiological conditions mimicking the low oxygen atmosphere typical of tumors.
The talks we’ve been able to attend clearly show that the hypoxic environment tumors create contributes to regulation of processes driving cancer. Ralph DeBerardinis of UT Southwestern in Dallas described metabolic pathway choices in the lung, where the perfusion status of the tissue is a major determinant of metabolic preferences, and low oxygen and nutrient availability in the tumor increases expression of genes involved in glycolysis and glucose oxidation. The vital aspect of vascularization of tumors was also elaborated on by Peter Carmeliet of the KU Leuven, who explained his angiogenesis-based approach to tumor therapy. He targets endothelial cell metabolism in an attempt to normalize vasculature, increase perfusion and reduce hypoxia, and ultimately, reduce metastasis and therapy resistance. Celeste Simon of the University of Pennsylvania spoke about a protective role for HIF-1α in pancreatic neoplasia. The complex correlations between hypoxia signaling, altered metabolism, and tumorigenisis are at the heart of a plethora of research projects, and will ultimately yield new therapeutic approaches in cancer.
