Fat cells in the omentum, a large fatty pad of tissue that drapes over the intestines in the abdomen, fuel the growth of ovarian cancer by supplying nutrients and energy for rapid tumor growth, reports a University of Chicago research team in the recent online publication of Nature Medicine.
Ovarian cancer is the 5th leading cause of cancer deaths in women, and it often metastasizes within the abdominal cavity as opposed to distant organs. In 80% of women, by the time ovarian cancer is diagnosed, it has spread to the omentum. Frequently, tumors in the omentum grow larger than the original ovarian cancer.
Study author Ernst Lengyel, professor of obstetrics & gynecology at the University of Chicago, and colleagues set out to identify the role of these fat cells as conductors of ovarian cancer metastasis.
Researchers discovered that the spread of ovarian cancer cells to the omentum could happen very quickly. Ovarian cancer cells injected into the abdomen of healthy mice found their way to the omentum within 20 minutes. Furthermore, the research revealed that adipokines inside the omentum attracted the ovarian cancer cells. Disturbing these signals with inhibitors reduced this attraction by at least 50%.
Ovarian cancer cells quickly reprogram their metabolism to thrive on lipids acquired from fat cells once they reach the omentum. A protein fat carrier, FABP4, may be critical for this process and is a potential target for treatment.
When comparing primary ovarian cancer tissue with ovarian cancer tissue that had metastasized to the omentum, researchers found the cancer cells next to the omentum fat cells produced high levels of FABP4, whereas cancer cells far away from the omentum fat cells produced none.
Researchers inhibited FABP4, and the transfer of nutrients from fat cells to cancer cells was significantly reduced, as were tumor growth and the ability of tumors to generate new blood vessels.
Sources: http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nm.2492.html#/ref2; http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15494373