Faculty, Staff and Student Publications
Publication Date
1-2-2024
Journal
Nature Communications
Abstract
How cells coordinate cell cycling with cell survival and death remains incompletely understood. Here, we show that cell cycle arrest has a potent suppressive effect on ferroptosis, a form of regulated cell death induced by overwhelming lipid peroxidation at cellular membranes. Mechanistically, cell cycle arrest induces diacylglycerol acyltransferase (DGAT)-dependent lipid droplet formation to sequester excessive polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) that accumulate in arrested cells in triacylglycerols (TAGs), resulting in ferroptosis suppression. Consequently, DGAT inhibition orchestrates a reshuffling of PUFAs from TAGs to phospholipids and re-sensitizes arrested cells to ferroptosis. We show that some slow-cycling antimitotic drug-resistant cancer cells, such as 5-fluorouracil-resistant cells, have accumulation of lipid droplets and that combined treatment with ferroptosis inducers and DGAT inhibitors effectively suppresses the growth of 5-fluorouracil-resistant tumors by inducing ferroptosis. Together, these results reveal a role for cell cycle arrest in driving ferroptosis resistance and suggest a ferroptosis-inducing therapeutic strategy to target slow-cycling therapy-resistant cancers.
Keywords
Humans, Lipid Droplets, Ferroptosis, Fatty Acids, Unsaturated, Lipid Peroxidation, Triglycerides, Cell Cycle Checkpoints, Neoplasms, Diacylglycerol O-Acyltransferase, Fluorouracil
DOI
10.1038/s41467-023-44412-7
PMID
38167301
PMCID
PMC10761718
PubMedCentral® Posted Date
January 2024
PubMedCentral® Full Text Version
Post-print
Published Open-Access
yes
Included in
Bioinformatics Commons, Biomedical Informatics Commons, Medical Sciences Commons, Oncology Commons
Comments
Data Availability Statement
Supplementary Material
PMID: 38167301