by Bob Yirka , Medical Xpress

Dietary pro-oxidant therapy using a vitamin K precursor. Credit: Science (2024). DOI: 10.1126/science.adk9167

A team of molecular biologists and other medical specialists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York, working with a large number of international partners, reports evidence that a synthetic vitamin K precursor can be used to slow the progression of prostate cancer in lab mice.

In their study, published in the journal Science, the group first tested an antioxidant in lab mice with prostate cancer, then switched to the pro-oxidant supplement menadione. Emanuela Pannia and James Dowling with The Hospital for Sick Children, in Toronto, Canada, have published a Perspective piece in the same journal issue outlining the work done by the team on this new effort.

Prostate cancer is the second most common type of cancer in men, after skin cancer. Prostate cancer is also different from most other cancers in that it typically has a slow progression—so slow, in fact, that in some cases, doctors recommend no action be taken for older men.

On the other hand, it can sometimes be extremely deadly, progressing rapidly and resisting treatment. In this new effort, the research team investigated the possibility of using a precursor to vitamin K, known more generally as K3, or the pro-oxidant supplement menadione, to slow or stop the progression of prostate cancer in mouse models.

The research team’s study originally started in 2001, when they began a human trial of an antioxidant vitamin E supplement involving more than 35,000 adult males. Originally, it was going to run for 12 years due to the slow progression of prostate cancer. Unfortunately, after just three years, it became apparent that vitamin E was not the answer—it seemed to speed up progression. Wondering if the opposite might work, they next focused on a pro-oxidant.

The team then began testing menadione in mouse models bred to have human-like prostate cancer. They found that it slowed cancer progression through depletion of a lipid called PI(3)P that cancer cells needed to survive. Without it, many of the cancer cells blew themselves apart, dramatically slowing progression of the disease.

More work is required to find out if menadione causes any side effects in mice and then to start work to find out if it might slow prostate cancer in humans.

More information: Manojit M. Swamynathan et al, Dietary pro-oxidant therapy by a vitamin K precursor targets PI 3-kinase VPS34 function, Science (2024). DOI: 10.1126/science.adk9167

Emanuela Pannia et al, A pro-oxidant suppresses unrelated diseases, Science (2024). DOI: 10.1126/science.adt2538

Journal information:Science