Anti-Angiongenic Effects of mTOR-Inhibitors Is Regulated by AKT Activity in Multiple Myeloma Cells.

Inhibitors of the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), such as rapamycin (RAPA) and CCI-779 (CCI), have potential as anti-tumor agents against multiple myeloma (MM). Since other tumor models have demonstrated that heightened AKT activity induces hypersensitivity to mTOR inhibitors, we stably transfected U266 human MM cells with a constitutively activated AKT allele (U266-AKT) or empty vector control (U266-EV) in order to further explore the underlying mechanisms of this phenomena. Analysis of cell death demonstrated that U266-AKT were significantly more sensitive to RAPA in vitro, with an ED50 of 0.01 nM versus an ED50 of >100 nM for U266-EV control cells. A similar alteration of sensitivity to CCI was demonstrated in U266 isogenic tumors grown in NOD/SCID mice and treated with CCI in vivo. Analysis of the excised tumor nodules demonstrated a >5 fold inclease in apoptotic nuclei in U266-AKT tumors treated with CCI compared to isogenic control tumors, despite previous reports that mTOR inhibitors do not induce apoptosis in MM cells in vitro. One potential explanation for this is that AKT regulates the ability of CCI to inhibit angiogenesis, which is only relevent in vivo, and thereby indirectly induces apoptotic cell death. In support of this hypothesis, we demonstrated that CCI significantly decreased angiogenesis (measued by in situ staining of excised tumor nodules with CD34, a marker for endothelial cells) by 80% in U266-AKT, and only by 67% in isogenic controls. Since previous studies demonstrated that AKT/mTOR regulates the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and hypoxia inducible factor 1a (HIF1a), we hypothesized that MM cells with heightened AKT activity may be more sensitive to the CCI-mediated inhibition of these critical angiogenic factors. In vitro, RAPA was markedly more effective at inhibiting HIF-1a and VEGF expression from U266-AKT compared to U266-EV control cells. One possible explanation for the regulatory role of AKT in the RAPA/CCI response is that MM cells with hyperactive AKT function depend upon mTOR-mediated (i.e. cap-dependent) translational pathway to express critical proteins like VEGF and HIF-1a, while “low-AKT” MM cells may be able to utilize non-mTOR dependent (i.e. cap-independent) salvage pathways to express these critical proteins and are thereby resistant to mTOR inhibitors.