GDF15 overexpression dreived from tumor-associated macrophages and cancer cells in the microenvironment of human esophageal squamous cell carcinoma promotes tumor growth and poor prognosis

ABSTRACT: Tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs) are known to be involved in progression, angiogenesis and motility of various cancers. We have previously reported the association between increased number of infiltrating TAMs with tumor progression and poor prognosis in esophageal squamous cell carcinomas (ESCCs). To study roles of TAMs in ESCC, we first exposed peripheral blood monocytes (PBMo) derived macrophages from healthy volunteers to conditioned media of TE series human ESCC cell line (TECM) and confirmed the induction of expression of M2 macrophage marker, CD204, and protumorigenic factors, interleukin (IL)-10, VEGFA and MMPs. Next, we compared gene expression profile between PBMo-derived macrophages and PBMo-derived macrophages stimulated with TECM by cDNA microarray. Based on the result, we focused on growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF15) among highly expressed genes including IL-6, IL-8 and CXCL1. Immunohistochemical study on 70 cases of surgically resected ESCCs revealed that GDF15 was detected not only in macrophages but also in cancer cells. High expression of GDF15 in ESCCs was significantly correlated with more malignant phenotypes including lymph and blood vessel invasion, lymph node metastasis as well as clinical stages. Patients with high expression of GDF15 showed poor disease-free survival (p = 0.011) and overall survival (p = 0.041). Furthermore, we found that recombinant human GDF15 promote cell proliferation and phosphorylation of both Akt and Erk1/2 in ESCC cell lines in vitro. These results indicate that GDF15 is secreted by both TAMs and cancer cells in tumor microenvironment and is associated with aberrant growth and poor prognosis of human ESCC. We exposed PBMo-derived macrophages from healthy volunteers to TECM and observed their acquisition of TAM-like characters in this study. We further investigated specific cancer-associated gene expression profile in TECM induced TAM-like macrophages by cDNA microarray analysis.

ORGANISM(S): Homo sapiens

SUBMITTER: Naoki Urakawa 

PROVIDER: E-GEOD-59948 | biostudies-arrayexpress |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-arrayexpress