Advances in Targeting Signal Transduction Pathways
// James A. McCubrey 1 , Linda S. Steelman 1 , William H. Chappell 1 , Lin Sun 1,2 , Nicole M. Davis 1 , Stephen L. Abrams 1 , Richard A. Franklin 1 , Lucio Cocco 3 , Camilla Evangelisti 4 , Francesca Chiarini 4 , Alberto M. Martelli 3,4 , Massimo Libra 5 , Saverio Candido 5 , Giovanni Ligresti 5 , Grazia Malaponte 5 , Maria C. Mazzarino 5 , Paolo Fagone 5 , Marco Donia 5 , Ferdinando Nicoletti 5 , Jerry Polesel 6 , Renato Talamini 6 , Jorg Basecke 7 , Sanja Mijatovic 8 , Danijela Maksimovic-Ivanic 8 , Michele Milella 9 , Agostino Tafuri 10 , Joanna Dulinska-Litewka 11 , Piotr Laidler 11 , Antonio B. D’Assoro 12 , Lyudmyla Drobot 13 , Kazuo Umezawa 14 , Giuseppe Montalto 15 , Melchiorre Cer…
Ras/Raf/MEK/ERK and PI3K/PTEN/Akt/mTOR inhibitors: Rationale and importance to inhibiting these pathways in human health
William H. Chappell 1 , Linda S. Steelman 1,2 , Jacquelyn M. Long 2 , Ruth C. Kempf 2 , Stephen L. Abrams 1 , Richard A. Franklin 1 , Jorg Basecke 3 , Franca Stivala 4 , Marco Donia 4 , Paolo Fagone 4 , Graziella Malaponte 4 , Maria C. Mazzarino 4 , Ferdinando Nicoletti 4 , Massimo Libra 4 , Danijela Maksimovic-Ivanic 5 , Sanja Mijatovic 5 , Giuseppe Montalto 6 , Melchiorre Cervello 7 , Piotr Laidler 8 , Michele Milella 9 , Agostino Tafuri 10 , Antonio Bonati 11 , Camilla Evangelisti 12 , Lucio Cocco 12 , Alberto M. Martelli 12,13 , and James A. McCubrey 1 1 Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University 2 Department of Physics, Greenville, N…
Ras/Raf/MEK/ERK and PI3K/PTEN/Akt/mTOR cascade inhibitors: How mutations can result in therapy resistance and how to overcome resistance
// James A. McCubrey 1 , Linda S. Steelman 1 , William H. Chappell 1 , Stephen L. Abrams 1 , Richard A. Franklin 1 , Giuseppe Montalto 2 , Melchiorre Cervello 3 , Massimo Libra 4 , Saverio Candido 4 , Grazia Malaponte 4 , Maria C. Mazzarino 4 , Paolo Fagone 4 , Ferdinando Nicoletti 4 , Jorg Basecke 5 , Sanja Mijatovic 6 , Danijela Maksimovic-Ivanic 6 , Michele Milella 7 , Agostino Tafuri 8 , Francesca Chiarini 9 , Camilla Evangelisti 9 , Lucio Cocco 10 , Alberto M. Martelli 9,10 1 Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, USA 2 Department of Internal Medicine and Specialties, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy 3 Consi…
New agents and approaches for targeting the RAS/RAF/MEK/ERK and PI3K/AKT/mTOR cell survival pathways.
The Ras/Raf/MEK/ERK and PI3K/PTEN/Akt/mTOR cascades are often activated by genetic alterations in upstream signaling molecules such as receptor tyrosine kinases (RTK). Targeting these pathways is often complex and can result in pathway activation depending on the presence of upstream mutations (e.g., Raf inhibitors induce Raf activation in cells with wild type (WT) RAF in the presence of mutant, activated RAS) and rapamycin can induce Akt activation. Targeting with inhibitors directed at two constituents of the same pathway or two different signaling pathways may be a more effective approach. This review will first evaluate potential uses of Raf, MEK, PI3K, Akt and mTOR inhibitors that have…
Ectopic NGAL expression can alter sensitivity of breast cancer cells to EGFR, Bcl-2, CaM-K inhibitors and the plant natural product berberine
Neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL, a.k.a Lnc2) is a member of the lipocalin family and has diverse roles. NGAL can stabilize matrix metalloproteinase-9 from autodegradation. NGAL is considered as a siderocalin that is important in the transport of iron. NGAL expression has also been associated with certain neoplasias and is implicated in the metastasis of breast cancer. In a previous study, we examined whether ectopic NGAL expression would alter the sensitivity of breast epithelial, breast and colorectal cancer cells to the effects of the chemotherapeutic drug doxorubicin. While abundant NGAL expression was detected in all the cells infected with a retrovirus encoding NGAL, t…