High intensity aerobic exercise suppresses cancer growth by regulating skeletal muscle-derived oncogenes and tumor suppressors (Lung)

High intensity aerobic exercise (90% of the maximum heart rate) can effectively suppress cancer proliferation in vivo. However, the molecular effect of aerobic exercise and its relevance to cancer prevention remains uninvestigated. The mRNA-sequencing technique (mRNA-seq) can provide a genome-wide depiction of gene expression changes by aerobic exercise. Mice with colorectal cancer were subjected to high intensity aerobic exercise, and mRNA-seq analysis was performed on heart, lung, and skeletal muscle tissues to analyze the molecular effects of the exercise in a genome-wide manner. The skeletal muscle-derived genes with exercise-dependent differential expressions were further evaluated for their effects on colorectal cancer cell viability. Regular and high intensity aerobic physical activity in the mice produced positive results in comprehensive parameters (i.e., food intake, weight, and survival rate) compared to those in the control groups (healthy and cancer with no exercise). A heatmap of differentially expressed genes revealed markedly different expression patterns between these groups. RNA-seq analysis of 23,282 skeletal muscle-derived genes identified a number of anticancer effector genes. Knockdown and overexpression of selected anticancer genes significantly repressed CT26 proliferation by 20% (p<0.05). Our finding based on the aerobic exercise cancer mouses model suggest that the high intensity exercise resulted in a global change in gene expression patterns, particularly those that affect cancer cell viability. Examination of 4 group (i.e., Blue, Green, Pink, and Yellow, each 10 samples of mice) E - Exercise T - Tumor