β-Hydroxybutyrate elicits divergent metabolic responses between MCF-7 and T47D ER+ breast cancer cells under glucose restriction

Abstract

BackgroundThe ketogenic diet is being explored as an adjuvant intervention in breast cancer because it lowers circulating glucose and elevates ketone bodies such as {beta}-hydroxybutyrate (BHB), but how individual ER+ breast cancer subtypes adapt to these conditions remains poorly characterized. We examined metabolic responses to BHB supplementation under glucose restriction in two ER+ breast cancer cell lines, asking whether metabolic adaptation patterns differ between models. MethodsMCF-7 and T47D cells were cultured under high glucose, glucose-restricted (5% of standard), or glucose-restricted with 10 mM BHB conditions and profiled by comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GCxGC-MS). Pairwise Welchs t-tests with Benjamini-Hochberg false discovery rate (FDR) correction were applied to identify treatment-responsive metabolites. Targeted assays quantified intracellular glycine, SHMT1 protein, and total branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) concentrations across a BHB dose range (2.5-15 mM). Patient tumor transcriptomic data from TCGA (n=1,084) and paired tumor-normal samples from GSE58135 (n=20) were analyzed for genes involved in one-carbon, ketone body, and BCAA metabolism. ResultsMCF-7 and T47D cells exhibited markedly divergent metabolic responses to BHB. In MCF-7 cells, BHB supplementation produced a broad pattern-level metabolic shift: 75% of detected metabolites trended upward when BHB was added to glucose-restricted cultures (C vs. B comparison), with 1,4-butanediol reaching nominal significance (FC=2.35, p=0.016) and a 4.1-fold trend increase in lactic acid (p=0.11), although no individual metabolite survived FDR correction. T47D cells showed essentially no metabolic response to BHB at the global level. Targeted assays detected an elevation in glycine at 5 mM BHB in both cell lines that did not follow a monotonic dose response and was not accompanied by changes in SHMT1 protein expression. Total BCAA levels were elevated by BHB in T47D cells but remained unchanged in MCF-7 cells. In paired patient samples, OXCT1 (log2FC = -1.41), SHMT1 (log2FC = -1.31), and ACAT1 (log2FC = -1.07) were significantly downregulated in ER+ tumors relative to matched normal tissue (adjusted p < 0.001 for all three). ConclusionsER+ breast cancer cell lines show heterogeneous metabolic responses to BHB supplementation under glucose restriction. The broad pattern of metabolite elevation in MCF-7 but not T47D cells suggests that capacity to utilize ketone bodies as metabolic substrate varies between ER+ models. The downregulation of OXCT1, ACAT1, and SHMT1 in ER+ tumors compared to normal tissue identifies these enzymes as candidate biomarkers that may help stratify which patients are likely to benefit from ketogenic interventions. Findings related to individual metabolites should be regarded as exploratory and require validation in larger, adequately powered cohorts.