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Updated: May 31, 2026

Live-Cell Förster Resonance Energy Transfer Imaging of Metabolically Regulated Akt Activation Dynamics in HepG2 Cells
Published on: May 23, 2025
Asymmetric cancer cell division regulated by AKT
Ipsita Dey-Guha1, Anita Wolfer, Albert C Yeh
1Centers for Cancer Research, Regenerative Medicine, Human Genetics Research, and Systems Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA 02114, USA.
Abstract:
Human tumors often contain slowly proliferating cancer cells that resist treatment, but we do not know precisely how these cells arise. We show that rapidly proliferating cancer cells can divide asymmetrically to produce slowly proliferating "G0-like" progeny that are enriched following chemotherapy in breast cancer patients. Asymmetric cancer cell division results from asymmetric suppression of AKT/PKB kinase signaling in one daughter cell during telophase of mitosis. Moreover, inhibition of AKT signaling with small-molecule drugs can induce asymmetric cancer cell division and the production of slow proliferators. Cancer cells therefore appear to continuously flux between symmetric and asymmetric division depending on the precise state of their AKT signaling network. This model may have significant implications for understanding how tumors grow, evade treatment, and recur.
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