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Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia

DHMEQ, a new NF-κB inhibitor, induces apoptosis and enhances fludarabine effects on chronic lymphocytic leukemia cells

Leukemia volume 20, pages 800–806 (2006)Cite this article

Abstract

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a low-grade lymphoid malignancy incurable with conventional modalities of chemotherapy. Strong and constitutive nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) activation is a characteristic of CLL cells. We examined the effects of a new NF-κB inhibitor, dehydroxymethylepoxyquinomicin (DHMEQ), on CLL cells. Dehydroxymethylepoxyquinomicin completely abrogated constitutive NF-κB activity and induced apoptosis of CLL cells. Apoptosis induced by DHMEQ was accompanied by downregulation of NF-κB-dependent antiapoptotic genes: c-IAP, Bfl-1, Bcl-XL and c-FLIP. Dehydroxymethylepoxyquinomicin also inhibited NF-κB induced by CD40 and enhanced fludarabine-mediated apoptosis of CLL cells. Results of this study suggest that inhibition of constitutive and inducible NF-κB by DHMEQ in combination with fludarabine is a promising strategy for the treatment of CLL.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Professor Marshall E Kadin, Harvard Medical School, for critical comments on the manuscript. This work was supported in part by Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research from Japanese Society for Promotion of Science and Integrative Research Program of the Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Kitasato University to R Horie.

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Author notes

  1. R Horie and M Watanabe: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Hematology, School of Medicine, Kitasato University, Sagamihara, Kanagawa, Japan

    R Horie, M Watanabe, M Taira & M Higashihara

  2. Department of Medical Genome Sciences, Laboratory of Tumor Cell Biology, Graduate School of Frontier Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan

    R Horie, M Shoda & T Watanabe

  3. Department of Hematology, Tokyo Women's Medical University, Shinjyuku-Ku, Tokyo, Japan

    T Okamura & T Motoji

  4. Department of Hematology, Imamura Branch Hospital, Kagoshima, Japan

    A Utsunomiya

  5. Department of Applied Chemistry, Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan

    K Umezawa

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  1. R Horie
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  2. M Watanabe
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  10. K Umezawa
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Correspondence to R Horie.

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Horie, R., Watanabe, M., Okamura, T. et al. DHMEQ, a new NF-κB inhibitor, induces apoptosis and enhances fludarabine effects on chronic lymphocytic leukemia cells. Leukemia 20, 800–806 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.leu.2404167

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