Leptin-Epinephrine Connection in GBM

  • July 23rd, 2011
  • Posted by
  • Comments Off on Leptin-Epinephrine Connection in GBM

Dr. Lawrence

The Leptin-Epinephrine Connection

The hormone leptin first came to scientific and medical attention because of its role in decreasing appetite. It turns out that leptin may also play a role in cancer. Leptin signaling activates several normal cellular pathways that a cancer cell can use to reproduce, survive, migrate and form new blood vessels. Gliomas produce leptin and its receptor. The higher grade gliomas make more leptin and receptor than lower grade gliomas. This suggests that leptin is involved in a tumor becoming more aggressive. In experimental models, decreasing leptin levels leads to tumor cell death.

The control of leptin levels in the body is very complicated. Theoretically, epinephrine should decrease leptin production. This goal of this project is to determine if epinephrine decreases leptin production in glioblastoma cell lines and thereby increase cell death.

Investigators include: John Lawrence (Post doctoral fellow) and Nick Cook (undergraduate).

Rovin R, Winn RJ 2007 Expression of O6-methylguanine-DNA-methyltransferase and temozolomide response in a patient with a malignant spinal cord astrocytoma. J Neurosurg Spine 6:447-450.

Rovin R, Winn RJ 2005 Pokemon expression in malignant glioma: an application of bioinformatics methods. Neurosurgical Focus 19:1-2

Lawrence JE, Cook NJ, Rovin RA, Winn RJ. Leptin Promotes Glioblastoma. Neurol Res Int, 2012, 2012.

http://www.hindawi.com/journals/nri/2012/870807/

Lawrence JE, Cook NJ, Rovin RA, Winn RJ. (2011) ?3-adrenergic agonists mimic eustress response and reduce leptin-mediated proliferation in a GBM cell line. Society for Neuro-Oncology.

Coming soon…