ACT-01 THE SECOND GENERATION ANAPLASTIC LYMPHOMA KINASE (ALK) INHIBITOR CERITINIB EFFECTIVELY INDUCES CELL DEATH IN HUMAN GLIOBLASTOMA CELLS

Anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) is a receptor tyrosine kinase which expresses only in the developmental stage of the brain during embryogenesis of human. On the other hand, a variety of ALK gene alterations, such as oncogenic fusion, activating point mutation, or wild type gene amplification, have been recently discovered as the powerful oncogene in various tumors, and these ALK mutations have also been known as the potential therapeutic targets against tumors harboring these ALK mutations. For example, ALK inhibitors have been already approved and used for the clinical treatment of non-small cell lung cancers harboring oncogenic ALK fusion. Previously, we reported classical ALK inhibitors triggered cell death in human glioblastoma (GBM) cells, which did not express ALK, via suppression of transcription factor STAT3 activation but not in normal tissue-derived cells. In this study, we investigated the anti-tumor effect of newly-developed ALK inhibitors in GBM cells. As a result, a second generation ALK inhibitor ceritinib induced cell death in various human GBM cell lines with lower concentration compared to other ALK inhibitors. Besides, ceritinib also suppressed STAT family activity in these GBM cell lines. From these results, we consider ceritinib might be a novel therapeutic agent against GBMs, and further investigation about the specific anti-tumor mechanism of ceritinib in GBM cells is currently on-going.