A Drug Discovery Pipeline for MAPK/ERK Pathway Inhibitors in Caenorhabditis elegans.

ABSTRACT: Oncogenic signaling through the MAPK/ERK pathway drives tumor progression in many cancers. Although targeted MAPK/ERK pathway inhibitors improve survival in selected patients, most tumors are resistant. New drugs could be identified in small-animal models that, unlike in vitro models, can address oral uptake, compound bioavailability, and toxicity. This requires pharmacologic conformity between human and model MAPK/ERK pathways and available phenotypic assays. In this study, we test if the conserved MAPK/ERK pathway in Caenorhabditis elegans could serve as a model for pharmacological inhibition and develop in vivo pipelines for high-throughput compound screens. Using fluorescence-based image analysis of vulva development as a readout for MAPK/ERK activity, we obtained excellent assay Z-sco

SUBMITTER: Gorgon S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11409438 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature