Butyric acid: inhibition of non-leukemic and chronic myeloid leukemia granulocyte macrophage clonal growth.

Butyric acid has been shown to inhibit the growth of several established tumor cell lines and to induce either granulocytic or erythroid differentiation in different human and murine leukemic cell lines. The dose-dependent effect of butyric acid was tested in vitro on the clonal growth of granulocyte macrophage progenitors in 13 patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) and compared with control bone marrow and peripheral blood responses. The growth of myeloid progenitors from both healthy donors and non-leukemic and leukemic patients was almost completely inhibited by 1.0 mM butyric acid. At 0.5 mM butyric acid, inhibition of CML progenitors, both from chronic phase and blastic phase patients, was significantly greater (P less than 0.01) than bone marrow from non-leukemic patients and peripheral blood controls. Butyric acid, a 4-carbon compound, was the most potent inhibitor of six short chain fatty acids tested on CML myeloid progenitors.