title: Potential for all-trans retinoic acid (tretinoin) to enhance interferon-alpha treatment response in chronic myelogenous leukemia, melanoma, myeloma and renal cell carcinoma.
abstract: This note mechanistically accounts for recent unexplained findings that all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA, also termed tretinoin) exerts an anti-viral effect against hepatitis C virus (HCV) in chronically infected patients, in whom ATRA also showed synergy with interferon-alpha. How HCV replication was suppressed was unclear. Both effects of ATRA can be accounted for by ATRA's upregulation of RIG protein, an 18 kDa product of retinoic induced gene-1. Increased RIG then couples ATRA to increased Type 1 interferons' production. Details of this mechanism predict that ATRA will similarly augment interferon-a activity in treating chronic myelogenous leukemia, melanoma, myeloma and renal cell carcinoma and that the addition of ribavirin and/or bexarotene will each incrementally enhance interferon-a responses in these cancers.
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05401, USA. rekast@email.com
authors.forename: Richard E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Kast