Metabotropic glutamate receptor 1 acts as a dependence receptor creating a requirement for glutamate to sustain the viability and growth of human melanomas

Oncogenic mutations in the serine/threonine kinase B-RAF are found in 50–70% of malignant melanomas1. Pre-clinical studies have demonstrated that the B-RAFV600E mutation predicts a dependency on the mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling cascade in melanoma1–5—an observation that has been validated by the success of RAF and MEK inhibitors in clinical trials6–8. However, clinical responses to targeted anticancer therapeutics are frequently confounded by de novo or acquired resistance9–11. Identification of resistance mechanisms in a manner that elucidates alternative ‘druggable’ targets may inform effective long-term treatment strategies12. Here, we expressed ~600 kinase and kinase-related open reading frames (ORFs) in parallel to functionally interrogate resistance to a selective RAF kinase inhibitor. We identified MAP3K8 (COT/TPL2) as a MAPK pathway agonist that drives resistance to RAF inhibition in B-RAFV600E cell lines. COT activates ERK primarily through MEK-dependent mechanisms that do not require RAF signaling. Moreover, COT expression is associated with de novo resistance in B-RAFV600E cultured cell lines and acquired resistance in melanoma cells and tissue obtained from relapsing patients following treatment with MEK or RAF inhibition. We further identify combinatorial MAPK pathway inhibition or targeting of COT kinase activity as possible therapeutic strategies for reducing MAPK pathway activation in this setting. Together, these results provide new insights into resistance mechanisms involving the MAPK pathway and articulate an integrative approach through which high-throughput functional screens may inform the development of novel therapeutic strategies.

In the mid to late 1980s, studies were published that provided the first evidence for the existence of glutamate receptors that are not ligand-gated cation channels but are coupled to effector systems through GTP-binding proteins. Since those initial reports, tremendous progress has been made in characterizing these metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluRs), including cloning and characterization of cDNA that encodes a family of eight mGluR subtypes, several of which have multiple splice variants. Also, tremendous progress has been made in developing new highly selective mGluR agonists and antagonists and toward determining the physiologic roles of the mGluRs in mammalian brain. These findings have exciting implications for drug development and suggest that the mGluRs provide a novel target for development of therepeutic agents that could have a significant impact on neuropharmacology.

The incidence of melanoma is increasing more than any other cancer, and knowledge of its genetic alterations is limited. To systematically analyze such alterations, we performed whole-exome sequencing of 14 matched normal and metastatic tumor DNAs. Using stringent criteria, we identified 68 genes that appeared to be somatically mutated at elevated frequency, many of which are not known to be genetically altered in tumors. Most importantly, we discovered that TRRAP harbored a recurrent mutation that clustered in one position (p. Ser722Phe) in 6 out of 167 affected individuals (∼4%), as well as a previously unidentified gene, GRIN2A, which was mutated in 33% of melanoma samples. The nature, pattern and functional evaluation of the TRRAP recurrent mutation suggest that TRRAP functions as an oncogene. Our study provides, to our knowledge, the most comprehensive map of genetic alterations in melanoma to date and suggests that the glutamate signaling pathway is involved in this disease.