DRES-09. REGULATORY EFFECTS OF THE CILIARY GTPASE ARL13B ON PURINE METABOLISM IN GBM

Abstract

Abstract Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common form of adult primary brain cancer. Despite an aggressive treatment regimen – surgical resection, irradiation, and temozolomide (TMZ) chemotherapy – patients’ prognosis is still grim. TMZ acts by methylating purines, specifically at the O6 and N7 positions of guanine, to induce cytotoxic DNA double-strand breaks. We thus wanted to explore how purine metabolism may contribute to TMZ-resistance. In mammalian cells, purine nucleotides can be recycled by the salvage pathway or generated via de novo synthesis. The salvage pathway is energetically inexpensive relative to de novo thus, highly proliferative GBM cells preferentially utilize the salvage pathway. We have shown that salvage synthesis is reduced in response to TMZ (p-value=0.0021), hinting that the cells may utilize de novo to evade therapy induced alkylation of purines. Using immunoprecipitation-mass spectroscopy analysis, we found a novel interaction between the ciliary GTPase ARL13B and IMPDH2, the rate-limiting enzyme in de novo synthesis. We have shown that this interaction, occurring at the C-terminal domain of ARL13B, plays a significant role in the regulation of purine biosynthesis as abolishing it through ARL13B knockdown reduced flux through de novo (p-value< 0.0001) synthesis as measured by the specific activity of IMPDH2. Further, the lentiviral-mediated rescue of ARL13B brings IMPDH2 activity back to basal levels (p< 0.0001). Given its canonical function as a GTPase, we hypothesize that ARL13B acts as a novel regulator of de novo synthesis by sequestering GDP, allowing IMPDH2 to sense and respond to the cytosolic levels of guanine nucleotides. Without ARL13B the de novo pathway is halted, forcing the cells to rely on salvage to replenish nucleotide pools. Reliance on this pathway in the presence of TMZ causes cells to incorporate damaged nucleotides as a result of the drug’s alkylating action leading to the increased therapeutic efficacy of TMZ.