Ganglioside GD2 in reception and transduction of cell death signal in tumor cells.

Background: Ganglioside GD2 is expressed on plasma membranes of various types of malignant cells. One of the most promising approaches for cancer immunotherapy is the treatment with monoclonal antibodies recognizing tumor-associated markers such as ganglioside GD2. It is considered that major mechanisms of anticancer activity of anti-GD2 antibodies are complement-dependent cytotoxicity and/or antibody-mediated cellular cytotoxicity.

Influence of gangliosides on the IL-2- and IL-4-dependent cell proliferation.

Ganglioside-induced apoptosis in the cells of IL-2-dependent cytotoxic murine cell line CTLL-2 was shown to be caspase dependent: GM1-, GM2-, and GD3-induced suppression of cell proliferation was cancelled by a general caspase inhibitor Z-VAD-FMK. Ganglioside-induced apoptosis pathways are different for different individual glycolipids; the differences exist both at the initiation and effector stages of the caspase cascade. Only for GM1-induced process, molecular mechanisms of signal transduction coincide with the ones for CD95 and TNFalpha: the participation of both the main initiation caspases 8, 1, and 4, and caspases 3 and 9 as well, has been shown.