Abstract 1442: Understanding the role of autophagy during cancer metastasis

Introduction: Autophagy is a catabolic process that involves the lysosomal degradation and recycling of cellular components. It acts as a cell protective mechanism to promote cellular homeostasis or survival during nutrient deprivation. Studies in the past decade have shown the involvement of autophagy during tumorigenesis, but much are left to be debated on its controversial role as a tumour suppressor or a potential protective role in promoting cancer cell survival. Knockout of autophagic core machinery proteins in mice models showed increase potential of tumorigenic development. Recent findings also suggested that autophagy plays a part during cancer cell metastasis, but till date, there is no significant evidence to clearly define the involvement of autophagy and the mechanistic behind it. Our study involves defining the role of autophagy during metastasis and the molecular drivers behind the process. Material & Methods: Using human squamous cell carcinoma cell lines, we induce epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) with three different methods to study the change in the autophagy level during the process. Results: Our unpublished data have demonstrated a higher autophagy level during our three models of EMT induction. Guided by the microarray data, we investigated the molecular drivers behind the change in autophagy levels and showed evidence that knocking down of certain molecular drivers reverses the effect and delay EMT. Citation Format: Maegan M. Lim, Ziqiang Teo, Chee Chong Choo, Pengcheng Zhu, Nguan Soon Tan. Understanding the role of autophagy during cancer metastasis. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 106th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2015 Apr 18-22; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(15 Suppl):Abstract nr 1442. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2015-1442