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Siciliano AC, Forciniti S, Onesto V, Iuele H, Cave DD, Carnevali F, Gigli G, Lonardo E, Del Mercato LL. A 3D Pancreatic Cancer Model with Integrated Optical Sensors for Noninvasive Metabolism Monitoring and Drug Screening. Adv Healthc Mater 2024:e2401138. [PMID: 38978424 DOI: 10.1002/adhm.202401138] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/26/2024] [Revised: 06/06/2024] [Indexed: 07/10/2024]
Abstract
A distinct feature of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is a prominent tumor microenvironment (TME) with remarkable cellular and spatial heterogeneity that meaningfully impacts disease biology and treatment resistance. The dynamic crosstalk between cancer cells and the dense stromal compartment leads to spatially and temporally heterogeneous metabolic alterations, such as acidic pH that contributes to drug resistance in PDAC. Thus, monitoring the extracellular pH metabolic fluctuations within the TME is crucial to predict and to quantify anticancer drug efficacy. Here, a simple and reliable alginate-based 3D PDAC model embedding ratiometric optical pH sensors and cocultures of tumor (AsPC-1) and stromal cells for simultaneously monitoring metabolic pH variations and quantify drug response is presented. By means of time-lapse confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) coupled with a fully automated computational analysis, the extracellular pH metabolic variations are monitored and quantified over time during drug testing with gemcitabine, folfirinox, and paclitaxel, commonly used in PDAC therapy. In particular, the extracellular acidification is more pronounced after drugs treatment, resulting in increased antitumor effect correlated with apoptotic cell death. These findings highlight the importance of studying the influence of cellular metabolic mechanisms on tumor response to therapy in 3D tumor models, this being crucial for the development of personalized medicine approaches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anna Chiara Siciliano
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
- Department of Mathematics and Physics "Ennio De Giorgi", University of Salento, c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Stefania Forciniti
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Valentina Onesto
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Helena Iuele
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Donatella Delle Cave
- Institute of Genetics and Biophysics Adriano Buzzati-Traverso, National Research Council (Cnr-IGB), Naples, 80131, Italy
| | - Federica Carnevali
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
- Department of Mathematics and Physics "Ennio De Giorgi", University of Salento, c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Giuseppe Gigli
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
- Department of Experimental Medicine, University of Salento, c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
| | - Enza Lonardo
- Institute of Genetics and Biophysics Adriano Buzzati-Traverso, National Research Council (Cnr-IGB), Naples, 80131, Italy
| | - Loretta L Del Mercato
- Institute of Nanotechnology, National Research Council (Cnr-NANOTEC), c/o Campus Ecotekne, via Monteroni, Lecce, 73100, Italy
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Chandrasekharan A, Tiwari SK, Munirpasha HA, Sivasailam A, Jayaprasad AG, Harikumar A, Santhoshkumar TR. Genetically encoded caspase sensor and RFP-LC3 for temporal analysis of apoptosis-autophagy. Int J Biol Macromol 2024; 257:128807. [PMID: 38101685 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2023.128807] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/10/2023] [Revised: 11/25/2023] [Accepted: 12/12/2023] [Indexed: 12/17/2023]
Abstract
The balance between pro-death and pro-survival signaling determines the fate of cells under a variety of pathological and physiological conditions. The pro-cell death signaling, apoptosis, and survival singling, autophagy work in an integrated manner for maintaining cell integrity. Their altered balance drives pathological conditions such as cancer, inflammatory disorders, and neurodegenerative diseases. Dissecting complex crosstalk between autophagy and apoptosis requires simultaneous detection of both events at a single cell level with good temporal resolution in real-time. Here, we have used two distinct fluorescent-based probes of caspase activation and autophagy for generating such sensor cells. Cells stably expressing RFP-LC3 as an autophagy marker were further stably expressed with a FRET-based probe for caspase activation with a nuclear localization signal. The functional validation and live-cell imaging of the sensor cells using selected treatments revealed that stress that induces rapid cell death often fails to induce autophagy signaling, and slow cell death induction triggers simultaneous autophagy signaling with caspase activation. The real-time imaging revealed the time-dependent shift of cells towards caspase activation while autophagy is inhibited confirming basal autophagy confers survival against apoptosis under stress conditions. Confocal imaging also revealed that cells under 3D culture condition maintain increased autophagy over monolayer cultures. High-throughput adaptability of the system extends its application for the screening of compounds that cause caspase activation, autophagy, or both demonstrating the potential utility of the sensor probe for diverse biological applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aneesh Chandrasekharan
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India.
| | - Shivanshu Kumar Tiwari
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
| | - Halikar Aman Munirpasha
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
| | - Aswathy Sivasailam
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
| | - Aparna Geetha Jayaprasad
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
| | - Ashwathi Harikumar
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
| | - T R Santhoshkumar
- Cancer Research Program, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Poojappura, Thycaud P.O., Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala 695014, India
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