Drivers of topoisomerase II poisoning mimic and complement cytotoxicity in AML cells

Recently approved cancer drugs remain out-of-reach to most patients due to prohibitive costs and only few produce clinically meaningful benefits. An untapped alternative is to enhance the efficacy and safety of existing cancer drugs. We hypothesized that the response to topoisomerase II poisons, a very successful group of cancer drugs, can be improved by considering treatment-associated transcript levels. To this end, we analyzed transcriptomes from Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) cell lines treated with the topoisomerase II poison etoposide. Using complementary criteria of co-regulation within networks and of essentiality for cell survival, we identified and functionally confirmed 11 druggabl…