Mechanism of depletion of liver glycogen in cancer cachexia.

Mice transplanted with a cachexia-inducing colonic adenocarcinoma (MAC16) show a progressive decrease in liver glycogen in direct proportion to the loss of body weight. Such tumours elaborate a lipid mobilizing factor (LMF), which produces a dose-dependent stimulation, not only of adipocyte adenylate cyclase, but also of hepatocyte adenylate cyclase in a GTP-dependent manner. These results suggest that LMF has the capacity to initiate hepatic glycogenolysis through an increase in cyclic AMP.