Adapting glycolysis to cancer cell proliferation: the MAPK pathway focuses on PFKFB3

Besides the necessary changes in the expression of cell cycle-related proteins, cancer cells undergo a profound series of metabolic adaptations focused to satisfy their excessive demand for biomass. An essential metabolic transformation of these cells is increased glycolysis, which is currently the focus of anticancer therapies. Several key players have been identified, so far, that adapt glycolysis to allow an increased proliferation in cancer. In this issue of the Biochemical Journal, Novellasdemunt and colleagues elegantly identify a novel mechanism by which MK2 [MAPK (mitogen-activated protein kinase)-activated protein kinase 2], a key component of the MAPK pathway, up-regulates glycolysis in response to stress in cancer cells. The authors found that, by phosphorylating specific substrate residues, MK2 promotes both increased the gene transcription and allosteric activation of PFKFB3 (6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase 3), a key glycolysis-promoting enzyme. These results reveal a novel pathway through which MK2 co-ordinates metabolic adaptation to cell proliferation in cancer and highlight PFKFB3 as a potential therapeutic target in this devastating disease.