Specific activation of glycolytic enzyme enolase 2 in BRAF V600E-mutated colorectal cancer

The BRAF V600E mutation occurs in approximately 10% of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC) and constitutes a distinct subtype of the disease with extremely poor prognosis. To address this refractory disease, we investigated the unique metabolic gene profile of BRAF V600E-mutated tumors via in silico analysis using a large-scale clinical database. We found that BRAF V600E-mutated tumors exhibited a specific metabolic gene expression signature, including some genes that are associated with poor prognosis in CRC. We discovered that BRAF V600E-mutated tumors expressed high levels of glycolytic enzyme enolase 2 (ENO2), which is mainly expressed in neuronal tissues under physiological conditions. In vitro experiments using CRC cells demonstrated that BRAF V600E-mutated cells exhibited enhanced dependency on ENO2 compared to BRAF wild-type cancer cells and that knockdown of ENO2 led to the inhibition of proliferation and migration of BRAF V600E-mutated cancer cells. Moreover, inhibition of ENO2 resulted in enhanced sensitivity to vemurafenib, a selective inhibitor of BRAF V600E. We identified AP-1 transcription factor subunit (FOSL1) as being involved in the transcription of ENO2 in CRC cells. In addition, both MAPK and PI3K/Akt signaling were suppressed upon inhibition of ENO2, implying an additional oncogenic role of ENO2. These results suggest the crucial role of ENO2 in the progression of BRAF V600E-mutated CRC and indicate the therapeutic implications of targeting this gene.