Chromosome 8q24 rearrangements are occasionally found in multiple myeloma and are associated with tumor progression. The 8q24 rearrangements were detected by FISH in 12 of 54 patients with multiple myeloma (22.2%) and in 8 of 11 multiple myeloma cell lines (72.7%). The breakpoints of 8q24 in 10 patients with multiple myeloma and in all multiple myeloma cell lines were assigned to a 360 kb segment, which was divided into 4 regions: approximately 120 kb centromeric to MYC (5 0 side of MYC), the region centromerically adjacent to PVT1 ($ 170 kb region, including MYC, of 5 0 side of PVT1), the PVT1 region, and the telomeric region to PVT1. PVT1 rearrangements were most common and found in 7 of 12 patients (58.3%) and 5 of 8 cell lines (62.5%) with 8q24 abnormalities. A combination of spectral karyotyping (SKY), FISH, and oligonucleotide array identified several partner loci of PVT1 rearrangements, such as 4p16, 4q13, 13q13, 14q32, and 16q23-24. Two novel chimeric genes were identified: PVT1-NBEA in the AMU-MM1 cell line harboring t(8;13)(q24;q13) and PVT1-WWOX in RPMI8226 cell line harboring der(16)t(16;22)ins(16;8)(q23;q24). The PVT1-NBEA chimera in which PVT1 exon 1 was fused to NBEA exon 2 and the PVT1-WWOX in which PVT1 exon 1 was fused to WWOX exon 9 were associated with the expression of abnormal NBEA and WWOX lacking their N-terminus, respectively. These findings suggest that PVT1 rearrangements may represent a novel molecular paradigm underlying the pathology of 8q24 rearrangementpositive multiple myeloma. Cancer Res; 72(19); 4954-62. Ó2012 AACR.

Bone marrow (BM) microenvironment (BMME) constitutes the sanctuary for leukemic cells. In this study, we investigated the molecular mechanisms for BMME-mediated drug resistance and BM lodgment in chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML). Gene-expression profile as well as signal pathway and protein analyses revealed that galectin-3 (Gal-3), a member of the β-gal–binding galectin family of proteins, was specifically induced by coculture with HS-5 cells, a BM stroma cell-derived cell line, in all five CML cell lines examined. It was also found that primary CML cells expressed high levels of Gal-3 in BM. Enforced expression of Gal-3 activated Akt and Erk, induced accumulation of Mcl-1, and promoted in vitro cell proliferation, multidrug resistance to tyrosine kinase inhibitors for Bcr-Abl and genotoxic agents as a result of impaired apoptosis induction, and chemotactic cell migration to HS-5–derived soluble factors in CML cell lines independently of Bcr-Abl tyrosine kinase. The conditioned medium from Gal-3–overexpressing CML cells promoted in vitro cell proliferation of CML cells and HS-5 cells more than did the conditioned medium from parental cells. Moreover, the in vivo study in a mice transplantation model showed that Gal-3 overexpression promoted the long-term BM lodgment of CML cells. These results demonstrate that leukemia microenvironment-specific Gal-3 expression supports molecular signaling pathways for disease maintenance in BM and resistance to therapy in CML. They also suggest that Gal-3 may be a candidate therapeutic target to help overcome BMME-mediated therapeutic resistance.

Multiple myeloma is a cytogenetically/molecularly heterogeneous hematologic malignancy that remains mostly incurable, and the identification of a universal and relevant therapeutic target molecule is essential for the further development of therapeutic strategy. Herein, we identified that 3-phosphoinositide-dependent protein kinase 1 (PDPK1), a serine threonine kinase, is expressed and active in all eleven multiple myeloma-derived cell lines examined regardless of the type of cytogenetic abnormality, the mutation state of RAS and FGFR3 genes, or the activation state of ERK and AKT. Our results revealed that PDPK1 is a pivotal regulator of molecules that are essential for myelomagenesis, such as RSK2, AKT, c-MYC, IRF4, or cyclin Ds, and that PDPK1 inhibition caused the growth inhibition and the induction of apoptosis with the activation of BIM and BAD, and augmented the in vitro cytotoxic effects of antimyeloma agents in myeloma cells. In the clinical setting, PDPK1 was active in myeloma cells of approximately 90% of symptomatic patients at diagnosis, and the smaller population of patients with multiple myeloma exhibiting myeloma cells without active PDPK1 showed a significantly less frequent proportion of the disease stage III by the International Staging System and a significantly more favorable prognosis, including the longer overall survival period and the longer progression-free survival period by bortezomib treatment, than patients with active PDPK1, suggesting that PDPK1 activation accelerates the disease progression and the resistance to treatment in multiple myeloma. Our study demonstrates that PDPK1 is a potent and a universally targetable signaling mediator in multiple myeloma regardless of the types of cytogenetic/molecular profiles. Cancer Res; 74(24); 7418-29. Ó2014 AACR.