Abstract 2783: Increased tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) expression in normal colonic mucosa with imipridone ONC201/TIC10 treatment: A potential biomarker for chemoprevention studies

• Published in: Cancer research (Chicago, Ill.) Ill.), 2022-06, Vol.82 (12_Supplement), p.2783-2783
• Main Authors: Raufi, Alexander G., De La Cruz, Arielle, George, Andrew, Hacking, Sean, Madka, Venkateshwar, Prabhu, Varun, Safran, Howard, Zhou, Lanlan, Brenner, Dean, Rao, Chinthalapally V., El-Deiry, Wafik S.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 1538-7445; 1538-7445
• DOI: 10.1158/1538-7445.AM2022-2783

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States and currently the most effective method at reducing risk of death is through screening. Although these strategies have reduced the incidence of CRC, they are invasive, costly, and have low rates of compliance. Chemoprevention aims to prevent or delay the onset of CRC through eradication or prevention of precursor colonic adenomas, ideally with affordable and nontoxic drugs. The imipridone ONC201, which induces apoptosis, in part, through upregulation of tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL), is currently undergoing preclinical evaluation as a potential chemopreventive agent. In preclinical models, we found that treatment with ONC201 is capable of increasing TRAIL expression in normal cells and can improve tumor suppression through immune surveillance by the innate immune system. To further assess potential biomarkers of response to ONC201, we evaluated expression of TRAIL and death receptor 5 (DR5), as well as markers related to cellular stemness such as LGR5 in colonic mucosa obtained from mice treated with ONC201 and vehicle controls. In this study, 16-week-old female C57BL/6 mice were administered vehicle or ONC201 50mg/kg (n=11) body weight by oral gavage twice a week for a total of five doses. Both immunohistochemistry and western blotting were used to evaluate differential expression of various potential biomarkers in both fresh frozen and FFPE colonic tissue. Using western blotting we found a significant increase in TRAIL expression in normal colonic mucosa obtained from mice treated with ONC201 as compared to vehicle controls. This finding was further validated using immunohistochemistry. Other markers, such as DR5 appeared unaffected with treatment. As efforts are currently underway to develop a CRC chemoprevention trial using ONC201, TRAIL may represent a biomarker of interest. Further analysis of stemness markers, as well as serum analyses are currently in process and may reveal other potential biomarkers for use in chemoprevention trial development. Citation Format: Alexander G. Raufi, Arielle De La Cruz, Andrew George, Sean Hacking, Venkateshwar Madka, Varun Prabhu, Howard Safran, Lanlan Zhou, Dean Brenner, Chinthalapally V. Rao, Wafik S. El-Deiry. Increased tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) expression in normal colonic mucosa with imipridone ONC201/TIC10 treatment: A potential biomarker for c