Fig. 7: Met restriction therapy boosts cetuximab efficacy via enhancing anti-tumor immunity.

(A) Effects of Met deprivation on ADCC in HONE1 and HCT116. (B) Effects of Met deprivation on HMGB1 release by ELISA in HONE1 and HCT116. (C) Immunoblot of GSDME cleavage in HONE1 and HCT116 under different conditions indicated. (D) HONE1 tumor growth in BALB/c-nu/nu mice. Mice were fed with normal diet or Met-restricted diet (n = 6). Drug regimen is described in methods. (E) HONE1 tumor growth in BALB/c-Nu/Nu mice (n = 6). Drug regimen is described in methods. (F) CT26-hEGFR tumor growth in BALB/c mice (n = 6). Mice were fed with normal diet or Met-restricted diet. Drug regimen is described in methods. (G) Immunofluorescence of HMGB1 in CT26-hEGFR tumors of mice receiving indicated treatments. Scale bar: 100μm. (H) Quantification of nuclear HMGB1-negative cells shown in (G) (n = 6). (I) Activated DC cell infiltration in CT26-hEGFR tumor of mice receiving indicated treatments (n = 5). (J) CD8⁺ T cell tumor infiltration in CT26-hEGFR tumor of mice receiving indicated treatments (n = 5). (K and L) Percentage of IFN-γ⁺ (K) and TNF-α⁺ (L) CD8⁺ T cell in CT26-hEGFR tumors of mice receiving indicated treatments (n = 5). (M) The signaling transduction pathway related to Met-mediated pyroptotic resistance, clinical relevance and potential applications are illustrated. This figure was created in BioRender. Wu, J. (2025) https://BioRender.com/x24v758.” Data are represented as mean ± SD. One-way ANOVA with Tukey’s multiple comparisons test (A, B, D, E, F). One-way ANOVA with Bonferroni’s multiple comparisons test (H–L). NS, not significant. The results are representative of three independent experiments (A–C). Source data are provided as a Source Data file.