Metabolic characterization of three hamster melanoma variants

Some enzyme activities and metabolic features of the black Ma melanotic, brown MI melanotic and Ab amelanotic melanomas of hamster were investigated. The activities of hexokinase and phosphofructokinase were similar in all three melanomas, the activity of NAD-dependent glycerol-3-phosphate dehydrogenase was higher in the amelanotic melanoma and that of pyruvate kinase and lactate dehydrogenase were slightly lower in MI than in the other tumors. The activities of citrate synthase, succinate dehydrogenase and malate dehydrogenase were higher in the Ma and MI melanotic melanomas than in the Ab amelanotic melanoma. The rate of labeled CO2 production from 6-14C-glucose, 1,5-14C-citric acid and U-14C-glutamine was about 2 times higher in melanotic melanomas than in amelanotic one, while no significant differences among the three melanomas were found in respect to 1-14C-glucose and U-14C-glycerol-3-phosphate. The production of 14CO2 was much higher from 1-14C-glucose than from 6-14C-glucose in all the melanomas studied. L-DOPA stimulated the production of 14CO2 from 1-14C-glucose much stronger in the Ma and MI melanomas than in the Ab melanoma. In none of the tumors the incorporation from 6-14C-glucose to CO2 was affected by L-DOPA. It is postulated that oxidation of glucose via the pentose phosphate cycle is involved in melanogenesis.