Surgery-induced wound response promotes stem-like and tumor-initiating features of breast cancer cells, via STAT3 signaling.

ABSTRACT: Inflammation is clinically linked to cancer but the mechanisms are not fully understood. Surgery itself elicits a range of inflammatory responses, suggesting that it could represent a perturbing factor in the process of local recurrence and/or metastasis. Post-surgery wound fluids (WF), drained from breast cancer patients, are rich in cytokines and growth factors, stimulate the in vitro growth of breast cancer cells and are potent activators of the STAT transcription factors. We wondered whether STAT signaling was functionally involved in the response of breast cancer cells to post-surgical inflammation. We discovered that WF induced the enrichment of breast cancer cells with stem-like phenotypes, via activation of STAT3. In vitro, WF highly stimulated mammosphere formation and self-renewa

SUBMITTER: Segatto I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4171628 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature