title: Methods to assess lipid accumulation in cancer cells.
abstract: Oncogenesis and tumor progression are associated with significant alterations in cellular metabolism. One metabolic pathway that is commonly deregulated in malignant cells is de novo lipogenesis. Lipogenesis is indeed highly upregulated in several types of cancer, a phenomenon that is linked to tumor progression and poor prognosis. Steroid hormones play an essential role in the growth of a variety of cancers and have been shown to increase the expression and activity of several lipogenic factors, including fatty acid synthase and sterol regulatory element-binding proteins. Such an altered gene expression profile promotes lipid biogenesis and may result in the accumulation of neutral lipids, which become visible as cytoplasmic lipid droplets. By using breast and prostate cancer cells exposed to steroid hormones as a model, here we describe methods for the direct qualitative and quantitative assessment of neutral lipid accumulation in malignant cells.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Jørgen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sikkeland
authors.affiliation: Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Jin
authors.affiliation: Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway; Institute for Cancer Genetics and Informatics, Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway. Electronic address: fahris@ibv.uio.no.
authors.forename: Fahri
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Saatcioglu
mesh_terms: D001391:Azo Compounds / Q000737:chemistry; D001671:Biochemistry / Q000379:methods*; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000378:metabolism*; D045744:Cell Line, Tumor; D004396:Coloring Agents / Q000737:chemistry; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D050356:Lipid Metabolism; D008297:Male; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D001391:Azo Compounds; D004396:Coloring Agents; C011049:oil red O
keywords: Breast carcinoma; Confocal microscopy; De novo lipogenesis; Neutral lipids; Oil Red O; Spectrophotometry