Author(s): BALDELLI, G., AVANCINI, A., BUDEL, L., GENTILINI, V., BORSATI, A., TONIOLO, L., CONTI, A., MILELLA, M., SCHENA, F., BRANDI, G., PILOTTO, S., TARPERI, C., DE SANTI, M., Institution: UNIVERSITY OF URBINO CARLO BO, Country: ITALY, Abstract-ID: 1931

INTRODUCTION:
Prostate cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers in men worldwide. The advances in diagnostic and therapeutic options associated with a usually moderate intrinsic biological aggressiveness have led to an increase in survival rate. To date, more than 90% of patients are alive at five years, but the high prevalence of the disease needs effective strategies to reduce the recurrence risk. In this sense, epidemiological evidence suggests that physical activity is associated with a lower cancer incidence and recurrence. Nevertheless, the underlying mechanisms of action are poorly understood. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of two different running races (5 Km and 10 Km) in the modulation of spheroids formation capacity of prostate cancer cells.
METHODS:
13 healthy subjects (mean age 47.7 ± 16.1 years; body mass index 24.6 ± 2.3 kg/cm2) performed two running races, 5km- and 10 km-long, interspersed by 2 weeks of wash-out time. The tumorigenic potential of prostate cancer cell line LNCaP was assessed through the 3D in vitro culture technique (soft agar assay), stimulating cells with sera collected before (PRE), immediately after (POST), and 3 hours after (POST 3h) running races. The spheroid formation ability was evaluated after 3 weeks of incubation, using GelCount (Oxford Optronix), an automated high throughput imaging and analysis system that optimizes the measurement of the spheroid number.
RESULTS:
Overall, 11 and 7 subjects performed the 5km and 10km races predominantly above the anaerobic threshold. In both running races, the spheroids formation analysis showed a significant average reduction in the tumorigenic capacity of LNCaP cells when stimulated with POST and POST 3h sera, compared to PRE sera. POST versus PRE sera analysis revealed that after the 5 km race, 10 out of 13 exercise-conditioned sera induced a reduction > 5% (-24.51 ± 13.21%) in the number of spheroids; a similar degree (-22.44 ± 11.85%) was observed after the 10 km race, in 9 out of 13 participants. This effect further improved when considering the POST 3h sera. In this case, all the sera from the 5 km and 12 out of 13 of those collected in the 10km race induced a reduction > 5% in spheroids number in comparison with PRE sera (-38.96 ± 17.89 and 39.92 ± 17.12%, respectively). Interestingly, no significant differences have been found in the effects of sera comparing the two running distances.
CONCLUSION:
These preliminary results suggest that acute training sessions reduce the spheroid formation of prostate cancer cells. This finding allows interesting speculations about the potential mechanisms underlying the impact of physical exercise in reducing the risk of prostate cancer recurrence to be further validated and explored. Moreover, the present work offers suggestions concerning the prescription, indicating that even a relatively short running distance may produce similar effects to a long one, with important implications for the real-world setting.