Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Comment
. 2023 Sep 8;8(1):336.
doi: 10.1038/s41392-023-01593-3.

Cancer cells evade ferroptosis: sex hormone-driven membrane-bound O-acyltransferase domain-containing 1 and 2 (MBOAT1/2) expression

Alexia Belavgeni  1 , Wulf Tonnus  1 , Andreas Linkermann  2   3
Affiliations
Comment

Cancer cells evade ferroptosis: sex hormone-driven membrane-bound O-acyltransferase domain-containing 1 and 2 (MBOAT1/2) expression

Alexia Belavgeni et al. Signal Transduct Target Ther. .
No abstract available

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
MBOAT1/2 prevents cell death of cancer cells that are deficient in the two major ferroptosis-surveillance systems GPX4 and FSP1. For cancer cells to proliferate (to sail the open seas) they must prevent ferroptosis (evade the ferroptopus). Ferroptopus is derived from “ferroptosis” and “octopus” which means “Ferroptosis is like an octopus”. Several ferroptosis-surveillance systems biologically emerged. Most cells rely on glutathione peroxidase 4 (GPX4) and the ferroptosis-suppressor protein 1 (FSP1) to survive (in our little cartoon, FSP1 and GPX4 are the masts of the boats). In addition to GPX4 and FSP1, prostate cancer cells produce MBOAT2 downstream of the androgen receptor (AR, the AR shipyard). In contrast, breast cancer cells generate MBOAT1 downstream of the estrogen receptor alpha (ERα, the ER shipyard). MBOAT1 and MBOAT2 can still prevent capsize in the absence of GPX4 and FSP1 (i.e., in stormy weather if the two masts of the ships are destroyed). Only if the keel of MBOAT1 or MBOAT2 breaks, cancer cell death by ferroptosis occurs (death by water influx caused by the ferroptopus)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment on

References

    1. Liang D, et al. Ferroptosis surveillance independent of GPX4 and differentially regulated by sex hormones. Cell. 2023;186:2748–2764. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.05.003. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Friedmann Angeli JP, et al. Inactivation of the ferroptosis regulator Gpx4 triggers acute renal failure in mice. Nat. Cell Biol. 2014;16:1180–1191. doi: 10.1038/ncb3064. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Tonnus W, et al. Dysfunction of the key ferroptosis-surveilling systems hypersensitizes mice to tubular necrosis during acute kidney injury. Nat. Commun. 2021;12:4402. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-24712-6. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Conrad M, Angeli JP, Vandenabeele P, Stockwell BR. Regulated necrosis: disease relevance and therapeutic opportunities. Nat. Rev. Drug Discov. 2016;15:348–366. doi: 10.1038/nrd.2015.6. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. von Mässenhausen A, et al. Dexamethasone sensitizes to ferroptosis by glucocorticoid receptor-induced dipeptidase-1 expression and glutathione depletion. Sci. Adv. 2022;8:eabl8920. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abl8920. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

Substances