Guest speaker, Professor Peter Carmeliet: "ANGIOGENESIS REVISITED: ROLE AND (THERAPEUTIC) IMPLICATIONS OF ENDOTHELIAL METABOLISM"

08.11.2018 | Zitta Glattrup Nygaard

Dear colleagues,

We are proud to present a very special guest speaker for this seminar, Professor Peter Carmeliet.
Peter is group leader of Laboratory of Angiogenesis and Vascular Metabolism, VIB-KU Leuven Center for Cancer Biology (CCB), Department of Oncology KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium and will give the talk: 

ANGIOGENESIS REVISITED: ROLE AND (THERAPEUTIC) IMPLICATIONS OF ENDOTHELIAL METABOLISM

Abstract 

The past 40 years of research in the angiogenesis field have focused on identifying genetic signals such as VEGF and Notch, which determine vessel sprouting. However, the role and therapeutic potential of targeting endothelial cell (EC) metabolism have been largely overlooked. We have recently reported that ECs are glycolysis addicted and that glycolysis importantly co-determines vessel sprouting downstream of VEGF and other pro-angiogenic signals. In addition, we documented that ECs are rather unique in utilizing fatty acid-derived carbons for the de novo synthesis of deoxyribonucleotides for DNA synthesis during EC proliferation when vessels sprout and found particular roles for enzymes involved in amino acid metabolism in EC proliferation, migration and survival. Moreover, targeting (blocking) glycolysis and fatty acid oxidation inhibit pathological angiogenesis and induce tumor vessel normalization (thereby reducing metastasis and improving chemotherapy), suggesting that these metabolic pathways are new targets for anti-angiogenic drug development without evoking systemic side effects. Furthermore, lymphatic ECs differ from other EC subtypes in their metabolic requirements for lymphangiogenesis. Since many of these metabolic targets are pharmacologically druggable, these metabolic pathways represent a new promising target for therapeutic anti-angiogenesis.

References

• G. Eelen, et al. Nature 561, 63-9 (2018)
• J. Kalucka et al. Cell Metab 28 (2018)
• S. Vandekeere et al. Cell Metab 28: 573-587 (2018)
• B.W. Wong et al. Nature 542: 49-54 (2017)
• S. Schoors et al. Nature 520: 192-7 (2015)
• S. Schoors et al. Cell Metab 19: 37-48 (2014)
• K. De Bock et al. Cell 154: 651-63 (2013)
• K. De Bock et al. Cell Metab 18: 634-47 (2013) 

The talk will be 45 min in duration, followed by 15 minutes of discussion.

Sign-up: It is possible to sign-up for coffee and cake, if you follow this link:  https://events.au.dk/BiomedicinSeminar14November2018