Angiogenin secretion from hepatoma cells activates hepatic stellate cells to amplify a self-sustained cycle promoting liver cancer.

ABSTRACT: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) frequently develops in a pro-inflammatory and pro-fibrogenic environment with hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) remodeling the extracellular matrix composition. Molecules secreted by liver tumors contributing to HSC activation and peritumoral stromal transformation remain to be fully identified. Here we show that conditioned medium from HCC cell lines, Hep3B and HepG2, induced primary mouse HSCs transdifferentiation, characterized by profibrotic properties and collagen modification, with similar results seen in the human HSC cell line LX2. Moreover, tumor growth was enhanced by coinjection of HepG2/LX2 cells in a xenograft murine model, supporting a HCC-HSC crosstalk in liver tumor progression. Protein microarray secretome analyses revealed angiogenin as the most

SUBMITTER: Barcena C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4300499 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature