Identification of new possible targets for leukemia treatment by kinase activity profiling

To date, the biology of acute leukemia has been unclear, and defining new therapeutic targets without prior knowledge remains complicated. The use of high-throughput techniques would enable us to learn more about the biology of the disease, and make it possible to directly assess a broader range of therapeutic targets. In this study we have identified comprehensive tyrosine kinase activity profiles in leukemia samples using the PamChip® kinase activity profiling system. Strikingly, 31% (44/120) of the detected peptides were active in all three groups of leukemia samples. The recently reported activity of platelet-derived growth factor receptor (PDGFR) and neurotrophic tyrosine kinase receptors (NTRK1 and NTRK2) in leukemia could be appreciated in our array results. In addition, high levels of peptide phosphorylation were demonstrated for peptides related to macrophage stimulating 1 receptor (MST1R). A provisional signal transduction scheme of the common active peptides was constructed and used to specific...