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. 2021 Apr 30:551:46-53.
doi: 10.1016/j.bbrc.2021.02.126. Epub 2021 Mar 11.

Vitamin C induces ferroptosis in anaplastic thyroid cancer cells by ferritinophagy activation

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Vitamin C induces ferroptosis in anaplastic thyroid cancer cells by ferritinophagy activation

Xiaowen Wang et al. Biochem Biophys Res Commun. .

Abstract

Anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC) is a rare but highly lethal disease. So far, there is no available established treatment which can prolong its survival. In this regard, effective therapies are urgently needed. Vitamin C widely serves as an anti-cancer agent. However, the potential effects of vitamin C against thyroid tumorigenesis remained unclear. The present study demonstrated that vitamin C could significantly inhibit ATC cells growth through ferroptosis activation, evidenced by the GPX4 inactivation, ROS accumulation and iron-dependent lipid peroxidation. Our results demonstrated that vitamin C treatment induced ferritinophagy and subsequent degradation of ferritin, leading to the release of free iron. Excessive iron further triggered ROS generation via Fenton reaction. The positive feedback mediated by ROS and iron sustained lipid peroxidation and further resulted in ferroptosis of ATC cells. The better understanding of the anti-cancer mechanisms of vitamin C provides a potential strategy for ATC therapy.

Keywords: Anaplastic thyroid cancer; Ferritinophagy; Ferroptosis; Reactive oxygen species; Vitamin C.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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