By Sierra Williams

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Laura Sipe

Abstract

Previous research conducted at the University of Mary Washington showed that triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) cells may respond well to methionine restriction as a form of treatment. Cancer cells have a higher dependency on methionine than healthy cells, and utilizing this difference could allow treatments to target cancer cells while not damaging normal cells. This experiment was performed to determine what percent of methionine restriction shuts down protein synthesis in the cancer cells. The experiment was performed using E0771 cells, a type of TNBC cells. Cells were given media with 100%, 12% or 3% methionine. Puromycin, a nucleoside that acts as a stop codon, was used to determine the amount of protein synthesis that occurred in each treatment type. A Western Blot was done to visualize the amount of protein synthesis in each sample type. It was determined that protein synthesis decreased significantly in cells with 12% methionine restriction. Interestingly, we did not see a decrease in protein synthesis in cells treated with 3%. This could be due to cells entering autophagy, which could result in cancer cell death or further proliferation. This can be determined through further experimentation. We next want to explore how these starved cells can maintain protein synthesis, to potentially exploit these processes in the treatment of cancer.