Poster 148

IDENTIFICATION OF SIGNALING CHANGES AND

POTENTIAL COMBINATION THERAPIES WITH MDM2

INHIBITION IN DEDIFFERENTIATED LIPOSARCOMA

CELLS

Jeannine Garnett, PhD1; Kate Lynn Bill, BS2; Shen Li3;

Chad J. Creighton4; Peng Qiu3; Davis Ingram, BS2;

Ghadah A. Al Sannaa2; Svetlana Bolshakov1;

XiaoYan Ma1; Christine M. Kivlin, BS Biology1;

Caitlin May1; Raphael E. Pollock1; Dina C. Lev1;

Keila E. Torres, MD, PhD1; Alexander J. Lazar, MD, PhD2

1Surgical Oncology, The

University of Texas MD

AndersonCancerCenter,

Houston, TX, USA;

2Pathology, The

University of Texas MD

AndersonCancerCenter,

Houston, TX, USA;

3Bioinformatics and

Computational Biology,

The University of Texas

MD Anderson Cancer

Center, Houston, TX,

USA; 4Department of

Medicine, BaylorCollege

of Medicine, Houston,

TX, USA

Objective: Dedifferentiated

liposarcomas (DDLPS) are

aggressive tumors with

poor patient outcome.

DDLPS is characterized by conspicuous punctuated

12q13~22 amplification, resulting in overexpression of

MDM2. MDM2 ubiquitinates the tumor suppressor protein

p53 leading to its degradation, and sterically hinders its

activation at N-terminal phosphorylation sites. Currently,

MDM2 inhibitors are being evaluated for the treatment of

soft tissue sarcomas in early-phase clinical trials. Since

MDM2 inhibition enhances p53 activity in DDLPS, goals

of these studies included unraveling signaling changes

associated with an MDM2-p53 competitive inhibitor over

time in DDLPS cells, and identification of synergistic cotargetable

nodes.

Methods: A targeted reverse phase protein array captured

signaling changes of 4 DDLPS cell lines treated

with DMSO or an MDM2 inhibitor, Nutlin-3A, at 8 and 24

hrs. Significance was calculated using modified paired

two-sample t-tests (P <0.05), followed by controlling for

false discovery rates using the beta-uniform mixture model

(FDRs <0.05). Statistically significant protein changes were

evaluated using Ingenuity Pathway Analysis (IPA) at 8 and

24 hr timepoints. Western blot validations are ongoing, and

upregulated oncogenic signaling nodes will be co-targeted

and evaluated using proliferation assays.

Results: After DDLPS cells were treated with Nutlin-3A for

8 hrs, 28 proteins significantly changed in their expression

or activation status, and at 24 hrs 67 proteins were altered.

Fold changes of significant total proteins entered into IPA

revealed that the top signaling network affected was cell

death and survival. Interestingly this network was not predicted

to be regulated by p53 at 8 hrs, but strong pathway

interconnections suggested that it was p-53-modulated

at 24 hrs. Additionally, potential combination therapeutic

strategies have been identified.

233

Conclusion: A broader understanding of signaling changes

and potential nodes of DDLPS therapeutic vulnerability

is critical for the effective use of MDM2 inhibitors in the

clinical setting.