Different mitochondrial response to cisplatin and hyperthermia treatment in human AGS, Caco-2 and T3M4 cancer cell lines.

Gastrointestinal cancers (gastric, pancreatic and colorectal) are life-threatening diseases, which easily spread to peritoneal cavity (Juhl et al. in Int J Cancer 57:330-335, 1994; Schneider et al. in Gastroenterology 128:1606-1625, 2005; Geer and Brennan in Am J Surg 165:68-72 1993). Application of hyperthermal intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) is one of the choices treating these malignancies and prolonging patient survival time. Despite numbers of clinical trials showing positive effects of HIPEC against various types of cancer, the question whether hyperthermia significantly potentiate the cytotoxicity of cisplatin remains unanswered. Little information is available on the HIPEC effect at the level of mitochondria. To define the effect of hyperthermia (40 °C and 43 °C) to cisplatin treated human gastric AGS, pancreatic T3M4 and colorectal Caco-2 cancer cells, we established an in vitro experiment, which mimics clinical HIPEC conditions. Giving the importance of mitochondrial energy metabolism in cancer, we investigated the effect of cisplatin and hyperthermia on mitochondrial Complex-I (glutamate/malate) and complex-II (succinate) dependent respiratory rates, the coupling of oxidative phosphorylation, the proton permeability of mitochondrial inner membrane and on the integrity of mitochondrial outer membrane in Caco-2, AGS and T3M4 cancer cell lines. Our main findings are: 1) treatment of cells with cisplatin causes the impairment of mitochondrial functions - the increase in the proton permeability of mitochondrial inner membrane and decrease in the oxidative phosphorylation efficiency in Caco-2, AGS and T3M4 cancer cells; 2) hyperthermia (40 °C and 43 °C) increased state 2 respiration rate only in AGS cells without any effects on Caco-2 and T3M4 cells; 3) hyperthermia in combination with cisplatin doesn't enhance cisplatin effect neither in Caco-2 and T3M4 nor in AGS cells. Thus, our results show the different mitochondrial response of gastric AGS, pancreatic T3M4 and colorectal Caco-2 cancer cells to cisplatin or/and hyperthermia - treatment. Further studies are needed to find the mechanisms of cell line - specific mitochondrial response to cisplatin and hyperthermia.