Pharmacologic Inhibition of β-Catenin With Pyrvinium Inhibits Murine and Human Models of Wilms Tumor

Wilms tumor (WT) is the most common renal malignancy in children and the fourth most common pediatric solid malignancy in the US. Although the mechanisms underlying the WT biology are complex, these tumors most often demonstrate activation of the canonical Wnt/beta-catenin pathway. We and others have shown that constitutive activation of beta-catenin restricted to the renal epithelium is sufficient to induce primitive renal epithelial tumors, which resemble human WT. Here we demonstrate that pharmacologic inhibition of beta-catenin gene transcription with pyrvinium inhibits tumor growth and metastatic progression in a murine model of WT. Cellular invasion is significantly inhibited in both murine WT-like and human WT cells and is accompanied by downregulation of the oncogenes Myc and Birc5 (survivin). Our studies provide proof of the concept that the canonical Wnt/beta-catenin pathway may be a novel therapeutic target in the management of WT.