Glycolytic metabolism and tumour response to fractionated irradiation.

Abstract Background and purpose To study whether pre-therapeutic lactate or pyruvate predict for tumour response to fractionated irradiation and to identify possible coherencies between intermediates of glycolysis and expression levels of selected proteins. Materials and methods Concentrations of lactate, pyruvate, glucose and ATP were quantified via bioluminescence imaging in tumour xenografts derived from 10 human head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) lines. Tumours were irradiated with 30 fractions within 6weeks. Expression levels of the selected proteins in tumours were measured at the mRNA and protein level. Tumour-infiltrating leucocytes were quantified after staining for CD45…