Targeted biologic inhibition of both tumor cell-intrinsic and intercellular CLPTM1L/CRR9-mediated chemotherapeutic drug resistance

Recurrence of therapy-resistant tumors is a principal problem in solid tumor oncology, particularly in ovarian cancer. Despite common complete responses to first line, platinum-based therapies, most women with ovarian cancer recur, and eventually, nearly all with recurrent disease develop platinum resistance. Likewise, both intrinsic and acquired resistance contribute to the dismal prognosis of pancreatic cancer. Our previous work and that of others has established CLPTM1L (cleft lip and palate transmembrane protein 1-like)/CRR9 (cisplatin resistance related protein 9) as a cytoprotective oncofetal protein that is present on the tumor cell surface. We show that CLPTM1L is broadly overexpressed and accumulated on the plasma membrane of ovarian tumor cells, while weakly or not expressed in normal tissues. High expression of CLPTM1L is associated with poor outcome in ovarian serous adenocarcinoma. Robust re-sensitization of resistant ovarian cancer cells to platinum-based therapy was achieved using human monoclonal biologics inhibiting CLPTM1L in both orthotopic isografts and patient-derived cisplatin resistant xenograft models. Furthermore, we demonstrate that in addition to cell-autonomous cytoprotection by CLPTM1L, extracellular CLPTM1L confers resistance to chemotherapeutic killing in an ectodomain-dependent fashion, and that this intercellular resistance mechanism is inhibited by anti-CLPTM1L biologics. Specifically, exosomal CLPTM1L from cisplatin-resistant ovarian carcinoma cell lines conferred resistance to cisplatin in drug-sensitive parental cell lines. CLPTM1L is present in extracellular vesicle fractions of tumor culture supernatants and in patients’ serum with increasing abundance upon chemotherapy treatment. These findings have encouraging implications for the use of anti-CLPTM1L targeted biologics in the treatment of therapy-resistant tumors.