Molecular determinants of terminal growth arrest induced in tumor cells by a chemotherapeutic agent

Treatment with chemotherapy or radiation is not invariably cytotoxic to all tumor cells. Some of the cells that survive treatment recover and resume proliferation, whereas others undergo permanent growth arrest. To understand the nature of treatment-induced terminal growth arrest, colon carcinoma cells were exposed to doxorubicin, and surviving cells were separated into proliferating and growth-arrested populations. Only growth-arrested cells displayed phenotypic markers of cell senescence and failed to form colonies. Gene expression was compared between senescent and proliferating fractions of drug-treated cells by using cDNA microarray hybridization and reverse transcription–PCR. Drug-induced senescence was associated with inhibition of genes involved in cell proliferation and with coinduction of multiple intracellular and secreted growth inhibitors. Several tumor suppressors and other genes that are down-regulated in carcinogenesis were up-regulated in senescent tumor cells. Induction of most growth inhibitors was delayed but not abolished in cells with homozygous knockout of p53, in agreement with only limited p53 dependence of drug-induced terminal growth arrest. On the other hand, senescent cells overexpressed secreted proteins with antiapoptotic, mitogenic, and angiogenic activities, suggesting that drug-induced senescence is associated with paracrine tumor-promoting effects. About one-third of the genes up-regulated in senescent cells and almost all of the down-regulated genes showed decreased or delayed changes in p21 ^{Waf1/Cip1/Sdi1} -deficient cells, indicating that p21 is a major mediator of the effects of p53 on gene expression. Elucidation of molecular changes in tumor cells that undergo drug-induced senescence suggests potential strategies for diagnostics and therapeutic modulation of this antiproliferative response in cancer treatment.