High expression of p300 in HCC predicts shortened overall survival in association with enhanced epithelial mesenchymal transition of HCC cells

2011 ◽  
Vol 310 (2) ◽  
pp. 140-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chihiro Yokomizo ◽  
Kanji Yamaguchi ◽  
Yoshito Itoh ◽  
Takeshi Nishimura ◽  
Atsushi Umemura ◽  
...  
Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 801
Author(s):  
Joyce Y. Buikhuisen ◽  
Patricia M. Gomez Barila ◽  
Arezo Torang ◽  
Daniëlle Dekker ◽  
Joan H. de Jong ◽  
...  

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a heterogeneous disease that can currently be subdivided into four distinct consensus molecular subtypes (CMS) based on gene expression profiling. The CMS4 subtype is marked by high expression of mesenchymal genes and is associated with a worse overall prognosis compared to other CMSs. Importantly, this subtype responds poorly to the standard therapies currently used to treat CRC. We set out to explore what regulatory signalling networks underlie the CMS4 phenotype of cancer cells, specifically, by analysing which kinases were more highly expressed in this subtype compared to others. We found AKT3 to be expressed in the cancer cell epithelium of CRC specimens, patient derived xenograft (PDX) models and in (primary) cell cultures representing CMS4. Importantly, chemical inhibition or knockout of this gene hampers outgrowth of this subtype, as AKT3 controls expression of the cell cycle regulator p27KIP1. Furthermore, high AKT3 expression was associated with high expression of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) genes, and this observation could be expanded to cell lines representing other carcinoma types. More importantly, this association allowed for the identification of CRC patients with a high propensity to metastasise and an associated poor prognosis. High AKT3 expression in the tumour epithelial compartment may thus be used as a surrogate marker for EMT and may allow for a selection of CRC patients that could benefit from AKT3-targeted therapy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (11) ◽  
pp. 5543
Author(s):  
Jitka Soukupova ◽  
Andrea Malfettone ◽  
Esther Bertran ◽  
María Isabel Hernández-Alvarez ◽  
Irene Peñuelas-Haro ◽  
...  

(1) Background: The transforming growth factor (TGF)-β plays a dual role in liver carcinogenesis. At early stages, it inhibits cell growth and induces apoptosis. However, TGF-β expression is high in advanced stages of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and cells become resistant to TGF-β induced suppressor effects, responding to this cytokine undergoing epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT), which contributes to cell migration and invasion. Metabolic reprogramming has been established as a key hallmark of cancer. However, to consider metabolism as a therapeutic target in HCC, it is necessary to obtain a better understanding of how reprogramming occurs, which are the factors that regulate it, and how to identify the situation in a patient. Accordingly, in this work we aimed to analyze whether a process of full EMT induced by TGF-β in HCC cells induces metabolic reprogramming. (2) Methods: In vitro analysis in HCC cell lines, metabolomics and transcriptomics. (3) Results: Our findings indicate a differential metabolic switch in response to TGF-β when the HCC cells undergo a full EMT, which would favor lipolysis, increased transport and utilization of free fatty acids (FFA), decreased aerobic glycolysis and an increase in mitochondrial oxidative metabolism. (4) Conclusions: EMT induced by TGF-β in HCC cells reprograms lipid metabolism to facilitate the utilization of FFA and the entry of acetyl-CoA into the TCA cycle, to sustain the elevated requirements of energy linked to this process.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bin Yang ◽  
Chunping Wang ◽  
Hui Xie ◽  
Yiwu Wang ◽  
Jiagan Huang ◽  
...  

Abstract Molecular targeted agents, such as sorafenib, remain the only choice of an antitumor drug for the treatment of advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The Notch signaling pathway plays central roles in regulating the cellular injury/stress response, anti-apoptosis, or epithelial–mesenchymal transition process in HCC cells, and is a promising target for enhancing the sensitivity of HCC cells to antitumor agents. The ADAM metalloprotease domain-17 (ADAM-17) mediates the cleavage and activation of Notch protein. In the present study, microRNA-3163 (miR-3163), which binds to the 3′-untranslated region of ADAM-17, was screened using online methods. miRDB and pre-miR-3163 sequences were prepared into lentivirus particles to infect HCC cells. miR-3163 targeted ADAM-17 and inhibited the activation of the Notch signaling pathway. Infection of HCC cells with miR-3163 enhanced their sensitivity to molecular targeted agents, such as sorafenib. Therefore, miR-3163 may contribute to the development of more effective strategies for the treatment of advanced HCC.


2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (9) ◽  
pp. 4770-4780 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hao Jiang ◽  
Hui-Jun Cao ◽  
Ning Ma ◽  
Wen-Dai Bao ◽  
Jing-Jing Wang ◽  
...  

Recurrence and metastasis remain the major obstacles to successful treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Chromatin remodeling factor ARID2 is commonly mutated in HCC, indicating its important role in cancer development. However, its role in HCC metastasis is largely elusive. In this study, we find that ARID2 expression is significantly decreased in metastatic HCC tissues, showing negative correlation with pathological grade, organ metastasis and positive association with survival of HCC patients. ARID2 inhibits migration and invasion of HCC cells in vitro and metastasis in vivo. Moreover, ARID2 knockout promotes pulmonary metastasis in different HCC mouse models. Mechanistic study reveals that ARID2 represses epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) of HCC cells by recruiting DNMT1 to Snail promoter, which increases promoter methylation and inhibits Snail transcription. In addition, we discover that ARID2 mutants with disrupted C2H2 domain lose the metastasis suppressor function, exhibiting a positive association with HCC metastasis and poor prognosis. In conclusion, our study reveals the metastasis suppressor role as well as the underlying mechanism of ARID2 in HCC and provides a potential therapeutic target for ARID2-deficient HCC.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rahul Sreekumar ◽  
Muhammad Emaduddin ◽  
Hajir Al-Saihati ◽  
Karwan Moutasim ◽  
James Chan ◽  
...  

Abstract Epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a process by which tumour cells lose epithelial characteristics, become mesenchymal and highly motile. EMT pathways also induce stem cell features and resistance to apoptosis. Identifying and targeting this pool of tumour cells is a major challenge. Protein kinase C (PKC) inhibition has been shown to eliminate breast cancer stem cells but has never been assessed in hepatocellular cancer (HCC). We investigated ZEB family of EMT inducer expression as a biomarker for metastatic HCC and evaluated the efficacy of PKC inhibitors for HCC treatment. We showed that ZEB1 positivity predicted patient survival in multiple cohorts and also validated as an independent biomarker of HCC metastasis. ZEB1-expressing HCC cell lines became resistant to conventional chemotherapeutic agents and were enriched in CD44high/CD24low cell population. ZEB1- or TGFβ-induced EMT increased PKCα abundance. Probing public databases ascertained a positive association of ZEB1 and PKCα expression in human HCC tumours. Inhibition of PKCα activity by small molecule inhibitors or by PKCA knockdown reduced viability of mesenchymal HCC cells in vitro and in vivo. Our results suggest that ZEB1 expression predicts survival and metastatic potential of HCC. Chemoresistant/mesenchymal HCC cells become addicted to PKC pathway and display sensitivity to PKC inhibitors such as UCN-01. Stratifying patients according to ZEB1 and combining UCN-01 with conventional chemotherapy may be an advantageous chemotherapeutic strategy.


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 3693
Author(s):  
Ching-Fu Weng ◽  
Chi-Jung Huang ◽  
Mei-Hsuan Wu ◽  
Henry Hsin-Chung Lee ◽  
Thai-Yen Ling

Introduction: Coxsackievirus/adenovirus receptors (CARs) and desmoglein-2 (DSG2) are similar molecules to adenovirus-based vectors in the cell membrane. They have been found to be associated with lung epithelial cell tumorigenesis and can be useful markers in predicting survival outcome in lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD). Methods: A gene ontology enrichment analysis disclosed that DSG2 was highly correlated with CAR. Survival analysis was then performed on 262 samples from the Cancer Genome Atlas, forming “Stage 1A” or “Stage 1B”. We therefore analyzed a tissue microarray (TMA) comprised of 108 lung samples and an immunohistochemical assay. Computer counting software was used to calculate the H-score of the immune intensity. Cox regression and Kaplan–Meier analyses were used to determine the prognostic value. Results: CAR and DSG2 genes are highly co-expressed in early stage LUAD and associated with significantly poorer survival (p = 0.0046). TMA also showed that CAR/DSG2 expressions were altered in lung cancer tissue. CAR in the TMA was correlated with proliferation, apoptosis, and epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT), while DSG2 was associated with proliferation only. The Kaplan–Meier survival analysis revealed that CAR, DSG2, or a co-expression of CAR/DSG2 was associated with poorer overall survival. Conclusions: The co-expression of CAR/DSG2 predicted a worse overall survival in LUAD. CAR combined with DSG2 expression can predict prognosis.


Cancers ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 2734
Author(s):  
Keita Kanki ◽  
Ryota Watanabe ◽  
Le Nguyen Thai ◽  
Chun-Hao Zhao ◽  
Kyoko Naito

Aberrant activation of histone deacetylases (HDACs) is one of the causes of tumor cell transformation in many types of cancer, however, the critical HDAC responsible for the malignant transformation remain unclear. To identify the HDAC related to the dedifferentiation of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) cells, we investigated the expression profile of HDACs in differentiated and undifferentiated hepatoma cells. We found that HDAC9, a member of the class II HDAC, is preferentially expressed in undifferentiated HCC cells. Analysis of 373 HCC patients in The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database revealed that the expression of HDAC9 mRNA positively correlated with the markers of mesenchymal phenotype and stemness, and conversely, negatively correlated with hepatic differentiation markers. HDAC9 was transcriptionally upregulated in epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT)-induced HCC cells treated with TGF-β. Genetic and pharmacological inhibition of HDAC9 in undifferentiated HCC cells showed decreased sphere-forming activity, which indicates an ability of anchorage-independent cell growth and self-renewal. We also showed that aldehyde dehydrogenase 1A3 (ALDH1A3) was downregulated in HDAC9-suppressing cells, and ALDH inhibitor disulfiram significantly decreased the sphere formation of undifferentiated HCC cells. Together, our data provide useful information for the development of HDAC9-specific inhibitors for the treatment of HCC progression.


Cells ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 486
Author(s):  
Daniel Neureiter ◽  
Christian Mayr ◽  
Paul Winkelmann ◽  
Bettina Neumayer ◽  
Eckhard Klieser ◽  
...  

Endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) is an effective treatment of early esophageal adenocarcinomas (EACs). The decision of ESD over esophagectomy is based on clinical evaluation of tumor depth and invasion. On a molecular level, tumor invasion is strongly associated with epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT). Here, we investigated whether localized ESD-resected and surgically resected EAC samples displayed different expression profiles of EMT protein and microRNA markers and whether these different expression profiles were able to retrospectively discriminate localized and surgically resected samples. By doing this, we aimed to evaluate whether preoperative measurement of EMT marker expression might support the decision regarding ESD over surgery. The results showed that ESD-resected samples displayed an epithelial expression profile, i.e., high expression of epithelial protein markers, whereas surgically resected samples displayed high expression of mesenchymal markers. In addition, the anti-EMT microRNA-205 was significantly more expressed in ESD-resected samples, whereas we found no significant differences in the expression levels of microRNA-200 family members. Furthermore, in our retrospective approach, we have demonstrated that measurement of selected EMT markers and microRNA-205 has significant discrimination power to distinguish ESD-resected and surgically resected samples. We suggest that the assessment of EMT status of EAC samples on a molecular level may support clinical evaluation regarding the applicability of ESD.


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