scholarly journals Nrf2 signaling attenuates epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition and renal interstitial fibrosis via PI3K/Akt signaling pathways

2019 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 104296 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun Wang ◽  
Haobo Zhu ◽  
Liqu Huang ◽  
Xiaojiang Zhu ◽  
Jintong Sha ◽  
...  
2019 ◽  
Vol 39 (8) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yan Wu ◽  
Qin Cai ◽  
Wei Li ◽  
Zhensheng Cai ◽  
Ying Liu ◽  
...  

Abstract Despite advances in chemotherapy, ovarian cancer (OC) is still the most lethal gynecologic malignancy. So, it is imperative to explore its mechanism and find novel targets to improve the outcome. Type II cyclic guanosine 3′,5′-monophosphate (cGMP)-dependent protein kinase (PKG II) has been recently reported to inhibit proliferation and metastasis in several tumors. The present study is to clarify the effect of PKG II combined with l-arginine (l-Arg) on OC cells. SKOV3 and A2780 cells were infected with adenovirus coding cDNA of PKG II to increase PKG II expression and l-Arg was applied to activate this kinase. CCK8 assay, Transwell migration and TUNEL assay were applied to detect the proliferation, migration and apoptosis of the OC cells, respectively. Western blotting was used to detect the level of total and phosphorylated proteins. Our results showed that co-treatment with PKG II and l-Arg inhibited EGF-induced proliferation and the expression of Proliferating Cell Nuclear Antigen (PCNA), Cyclin E and N-Cadherin, whereas up-regulated the expression of E-Cadherin, abolished the anti-apoptotic effect of EGF, prevented the process of epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) as well as blocked EGF-triggered Raf-MEK and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt signaling pathways. Our results suggested that PKG II activated by l-Arg could inhibit proliferation and migration and promote the apoptosis of OC cells. Based on the above results and our previous data, it is speculated that PKG II is an inhibitor of cancer with extensive effects.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1742
Author(s):  
Melysa Fitriana ◽  
Wei-Lun Hwang ◽  
Pak-Yue Chan ◽  
Tai-Yuan Hsueh ◽  
Tsai-Tsen Liao

Head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCCs) are epithelial malignancies with 5-year overall survival rates of approximately 40–50%. Emerging evidence indicates that a small population of cells in HNSCC patients, named cancer stem cells (CSCs), play vital roles in the processes of tumor initiation, progression, metastasis, immune evasion, chemo-/radioresistance, and recurrence. The acquisition of stem-like properties of cancer cells further provides cellular plasticity for stress adaptation and contributes to therapeutic resistance, resulting in a worse clinical outcome. Thus, targeting cancer stemness is fundamental for cancer treatment. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are known to regulate stem cell features in the development and tissue regeneration through a miRNA–target interactive network. In HNSCCs, miRNAs act as tumor suppressors and/or oncogenes to modulate cancer stemness and therapeutic efficacy by regulating the CSC-specific tumor microenvironment (TME) and signaling pathways, such as epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT), Wnt/β-catenin signaling, and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) or insulin-like growth factor 1 receptor (IGF1R) signaling pathways. Owing to a deeper understanding of disease-relevant miRNAs and advances in in vivo delivery systems, the administration of miRNA-based therapeutics is feasible and safe in humans, with encouraging efficacy results in early-phase clinical trials. In this review, we summarize the present findings to better understand the mechanical actions of miRNAs in maintaining CSCs and acquiring the stem-like features of cancer cells during HNSCC pathogenesis.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Ping Xu ◽  
Xiao Mo ◽  
Ruixue Xia ◽  
Long Jiang ◽  
Chengfei Zhang ◽  
...  

BACKGROUND: Potassium channels, encoded by more than seventy genes, are cell excitability transmembrane proteins and become evident to play essential roles in tumor biology. OBJECTIVE: The deregulation of potassium channel genes has been related to cancer development and patient prognosis. The objective of this study is to understand the role of potassium channels in lung cancer. METHODS: We examined all potassium channel genes and identified that KCNN4 is the most significantly overexpressed one in lung adenocarcinoma. The role and mechanism of KCNN4 in lung adenocarcinoma were further investigated by in vitro cell and molecular assay and in vivo mouse xenograft models. RESULTS: We revealed that the silencing of KCNN4 significantly inhibits cell proliferation, migration, invasion, and tumorigenicity of lung adenocarcinoma. Further studies showed that knockdown of KCNN4 promotes cell apoptosis, induces cell cycle arrested in the S phase, and is associated with the epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) process. Most importantly, we demonstrated that KCNN4 regulates the progression of lung adenocarcinoma through P13K/AKT and MEK/ERK signaling pathways. The use of inhibitors that targeted AKT and ERK also significantly inhibit the proliferation and metastasis of lung adenocarcinoma cells. CONCLUSIONS: This study investigated the function and mechanism of KCNN4 in lung adenocarcinoma. On this basis, this means that KCNN4 can be used as a tumor marker for lung adenocarcinoma and is expected to become an important target for a potential drug.


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