Single-cell transcriptomic profiling reveals that KLF2 limits tumor cell plasticity in hepatocellular carcinoma
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ABSTRACT:
ORGANISM(S): Mus musculus
PROVIDER: GSE330471 | GEO | 2026/05/16
REPOSITORIES: GEO
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Project description:Krüppel-like factor 2 (KLF2) is a tumor-suppressive transcription factor implicated in the regulation of epithelial-mesenchymal plasticity in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In this study, we performed ATAC-seq in HCCLM3 human HCC cells with or without KLF2 overexpression to characterize KLF2-associated changes in chromatin accessibility. Comparative analysis was used to identify differentially accessible chromatin regions and to investigate how KLF2 affects the transcriptional programs associated with Hippo/YAP signaling and EMT/pEMT-related cell plasticity.
2026-04-21 | GSE328230 | GEO
Project description:The epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) of malignant hepatocytes is a crucial event in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) progression and recurrence. We aimed to establish a human model of EMT to examine drug efficacy and specificity in HCC progression. Human HCC cell populations were characterized by immunofluorescence analysis, migration and invasion assays, array comparative genomic hybridization, whole-genome expression profiling and promoter methylation. Therapeutic agents clinically used against HCC were examined for efficacy by determination of IC50 values. Liver cancer cell lines showed either an epithelial or mesenchymal phenotype of which latter showed strong migratory and invasive abilities in vitro. The common cellular origin of both cell types indicated that mesenchymal HCC cells have been derived from epithelial hepatocytes through EMT in the HCC patient. Drug exposure of mesenchymal HCC cells showed higher resistance to the targeted therapeutic agents sorafenib and erlotinib as compared to epithelial HCC cells, which were slightly more resistant to cytostatic drugs. Most remarkably, combined treatment with doxorubicin and sorafenib caused increased susceptibility of both HCC cell types resulting in enhanced drug efficacy. Taken together, this novel model of human HCC allows to monitor the differential effect of liver cancer progression on drug efficacy in pre-clinical studies. hepatocellular carcinoma cell lines HCC-1.2 and HCC-1.1 cells, referred to as 3p and 3sp cells, respectively, were isolated from one HCC patient as described ( Sagmeister S, Eisenbauer M, Pirker C, et al. New cellular tools reveal complex epithelial-mesenchymal interactions in hepatocarcinogenesis. Br J Cancer 2008;99(1):151-9.). 3p cells of passages 10 to 12 and 3sp cells of passages 7 to 13 are termed 3p early and 3sp early, respectively. 3p cells between passage 71 and 76 and 3sp from passage 72 to 87 were termed 3p late and 3sp late, respectively
2011-11-21 | E-GEOD-26391 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Elevated lipocalin-2 (Lcn2) has been observed in multiple human cancers, but its biological roles remain unclear. Our purpose in this study was to investigate whether Lcn2 is involved in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) development via its involvement in invasion and metastasis. Using unsupervised hierarchical clustering analysis of tissue samples, we identified preferential expression of Lcn2 (>2-fold change) in the tumor group (differentiated group) versus the non-tumor group (liver cirrhosis group). LCN2 immunoreactivity was positively correlated with TNM stage (r = 0.194, P = 0.020), but not with differentiation or recurrence of HCC. Over-expression of Lcn2 was observed in HLK-2, HKK-2, and HLK-5 HCC cells. Knock-down of Lcn2 by shRNA in HKK-2 cells was correlated with the down-regulation of E-cadherin, CK-8, CK-18, and desmoplakin I/II (DesI/II) and the up-regulation of N-cadherin, vimentin (VIM), and fibronectin (FN), which are markers of the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) associated with tumor progression. The characteristics of EMT were reversed by adenoviral transduction of Lcn2 into SH-J1 cells. EGF or TGF-β treatment resulted in downregulation of Lcn2 with a concomitant change in EMT. Stable Lcn2 expression in HCC cells reduced the expression of the transcription factor Twist1, resulting in the inhibition of cell proliferation, migration, and invasion in vitro, and suppressed tumor growth and metastatic ability in a mouse model. These findings suggest that Lcn2 can reverse the EMT in HCC through transcriptional suppression of Twist 1. Thus, Lcn2 is a candidate metastasis suppressor and a potential therapeutic target for HCC. Unsupervised hierarchical clustering separated the samples into two main groups: a non-tumor group (NT, n = 40) and a HCC group (HCC, n = 40), and into two subgroups: a liver cirrhosis group (LC, n = 20) and a differentiated HCC group (difHCC, n = 20). Lcn2 was one of the unique genes with a two-fold or greater difference in expression from the mean with P < 0.01 based on the t-test for hierarchical clustering analysis.
2012-05-31 | E-GEOD-36411 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:The epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) of malignant hepatocytes is a crucial event in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) progression and recurrence. We aimed to establish a human model of EMT to examine drug efficacy and specificity in HCC progression. Human HCC cell populations were characterized by immunofluorescence analysis, migration and invasion assays, array comparative genomic hybridization, whole-genome expression profiling and promoter methylation. Therapeutic agents clinically used against HCC were examined for efficacy by determination of IC50 values. Liver cancer cell lines showed either an epithelial or mesenchymal phenotype of which latter showed strong migratory and invasive abilities in vitro. The common cellular origin of both cell types indicated that mesenchymal HCC cells have been derived from epithelial hepatocytes through EMT in the HCC patient. Drug exposure of mesenchymal HCC cells showed higher resistance to the targeted therapeutic agents sorafenib and erlotinib as compared to epithelial HCC cells, which were slightly more resistant to cytostatic drugs. Most remarkably, combined treatment with doxorubicin and sorafenib caused increased susceptibility of both HCC cell types resulting in enhanced drug efficacy. Taken together, this novel model of human HCC allows to monitor the differential effect of liver cancer progression on drug efficacy in pre-clinical studies.
2011-11-21 | GSE26391 | GEO
Project description:Epithelial to Mesenchymal Transition (EMT) has been associated with cancer cell heterogeneity, plasticity and metastasis. It has been the subject of several modeling effort. This logical model of the EMT cellular network aims to assess microenvironmental signals controlling cancer-associated phenotypes amid the EMT continuum. Its outcomes relate to the qualitative degrees of cell adhesions by adherent junctions and focal adhesions, two features affected during EMT. Model attractors recover epithelial, mesenchymal and hybrid phenotypes, and simulations show that hybrid phenotypes may arise through independent molecular paths, involving stringent extrinsic signals.
Of particular interest, model predictions and their experimental validations indicated that: 1) ECM stiffening is a prerequisite for cells overactivating FAK-SRC to upregulate SNAIL1 and acquire a mesenchymal phenotype, and 2) FAK-SRC inhibition of cell-cell contacts through the Receptor Protein Tyrosine Phosphates kappa leads to the acquisition of a full mesenchymal rather than a hybrid phenotype.
2020-06-30 | MODEL2004040001 | BioModels
Project description:The routine study of human malaria liver-stage biology in vitro is hampered by low infection efficiency of human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) lines (<0.1%), poor understanding of steady-state HCC biology, and lack of appropriate tools for trace sample analysis. HC-04 is the only HCC that supports complete development of human malaria parasites. We hypothesized that HCCs are in various intermediate stages of the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and HC-04s retain epithelial characteristics that permit infection. We developed an novel analytical approach to test this hypothesis viz. the HC-04 response to hepatocyte growth factor (HGF). We used online two-dimensional liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (2D-LC-MS/MS) to quantify protein expression profiles in HC-04 pre-/post-HGF treatment and validated these results by RT-qPCR and microscopy. We successfully increased protein identification efficiency over offline-2D methods by 12-fold using less sample material, allowing robust protein quantification. We observed expected up-regulation and down-regulation of EMT protein markers in response to HGF, but also unexpected cellular responses. HC-04 is thus susceptible to HGF-mediated signaling but to a lesser degree than what we observed for HepG2, a widely used, but poor malaria HCC model. Our analytical approach to understanding the basic biology of HC-04 helps us understand the factors that may influence its utility as a model for malaria liver-stage development. We observed that HC-04 treatment with HGF prior to the addition of Plasmodium falciparum sporozoites did not facilitate cell invasion, arguing for unlinking the effect of HGF on malaria liver stage development from hepatocyte invasion. Finally, our 2D-LC-MS/MS approach and broadly applicable experimental strategy should prove useful in the analysis of various hepatocyte-pathogen interactions, tumor progression and early disease events.
2014-02-17 | PXD000682 | Pride
Project description:Epithelial cells possess remarkable plasticity, having the ability to become mesenchymal cells through alterations in adhesion and motility (epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition or EMT). However, it is still unknown whether and how epithelial plasticity is kept in check in epithelial cells during development. Here we show that restricting the EMT of mammary epithelial cells by transcription factor Ovol2 is required for proper morphogenesis and regeneration. Deletion of Ovol2 blocks mammary ductal morphogenesis, depletes stem/progenitor cell reservoirs, and leads epithelial cells to undergo EMT in vivo to become non-epithelial cell types. Ovol2 directly represses myriad EMT inducers and its absence switches response to TGF-beta from growth arrest to EMT. Furthermore, forced expression of the repressor isoform of Ovol2 is able to reprogram metastatic breast cancer cells from a mesenchymal to an epithelial state. Our findings underscore the critical importance of exquisitely regulating epithelial plasticity in development and cancer. Refer to individual Series
2014-03-19 | E-GEOD-54126 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Epithelial cells possess remarkable plasticity, having the ability to become mesenchymal cells through alterations in adhesion and motility (epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition or EMT). Recent studies suggest that EMT endows differentiated epithelial cells with stem cell traits, posing the interesting question of how epithelial plasticity is properly restricted to ensure epithelial differentiation during tissue morphogenesis. Here we identify zinc-finger transcription factor Ovol2 as a key suppressor of EMT of mammary epithelial cells. Epithelia-specific deletion of Ovol2 completely arrests mammary ductal morphogenesis, and depletes epithelial stem/progenitor cell reservoirs. Further, Ovol2-deficient epithelial cells undergo EMT in vivo to become non-epithelial cell types, and that Ovol2 directly represses key EMT inducers such as Zeb1 and regulates stem/progenitor cell responsiveness to TGF-beta. We also provide evidence for a suppressive role of Ovol2 in breast cancer progression. Our findings underscore the critical importance of exquisitely regulating epithelial plasticity to balance stemness with epithelial differentiation in development and cancer. We report ChIPseq data illustrating Ovol2 genome-wide targets in mouse mammary epithelial cells, suggesting that Ovol2 regulates a plethora of genes associated with the EMT process. Immunoprecipitated samples from HC11 mouse mammary epithelial cells with antibodies against Ovol2 and control IgG respectively were used for ChIP-seq experiments.
2014-03-19 | E-GEOD-53925 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and cholangiocarcinoma (CC) are the major primary liver cancers in adults. It has been shown the phenotypic overlap between HCC and CC, comprising continuous liver cancer spectrum. As a proof of concept, a recent study has demonstrated a genomic subtype of HCC expressing CC-like gene expression trait, i.e. CC-like HCC, which has revealed common genomic trait of stem cell-like property and aggressive clinical outcome. However, the histopathological characteristics of these intermediate phenotype was not fully evaluated yet. Here, we found that a variant HCC with fibrous stromal component, i.e. scirrhous HCC, has CC-like genomic features. By performing gene expression profiling and immunohistochemical evaluation, we compared the morphological and molecular features of scirrhous HCC with CC and classical HCC. We found that the scirrhous HCC express both CC-like and stem cell-like expression traits. In addition, we observed the expression of core epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-related genes, which may contribute to the aggressive behavior of scirrhous HCC. Over-expression of transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) signaling was also found, implying its regulatory role in the pathobiology of scirrhous HCC. Conclusion: We suggest that the fibrous stromal component in HCC may contribute to the acquisition of CC-like gene expression trait in HCC. The expression of stem cell-like trait and TGF-β/EMT molecules may play pivotal roles in the aggressive phenotype of scirrhous HCC Gene expression profiles of HCC, CC and HCC with fibrous stroma were compared.
2012-08-31 | E-GEOD-31370 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:The routine study of human malaria liver-stage biology in vitro is hampered by low infection efficiency of human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) lines (<0.1%), poor understanding of steady-state HCC biology, and lack of appropriate tools for trace sample analysis. HC-04 is the only HCC that supports complete development of human malaria parasites. We hypothesized that HCCs are in various intermediate stages of the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and HC-04s retain epithelial characteristics that permit infection. We developed an novel analytical approach to test this hypothesis viz. the HC-04 response to hepatocyte growth factor (HGF). We used online two-dimensional liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (2D-LC-MS/MS) to quantify protein expression profiles in HC-04 pre-/post-HGF treatment and validated these results by RT-qPCR and microscopy. We successfully increased protein identification efficiency over offline-2D methods by 12-fold using less sample material, allowing robust protein quantification. We observed expected up-regulation and down-regulation of EMT protein markers in response to HGF, but also unexpected cellular responses. HC-04 is thus susceptible to HGF-mediated signaling but to a lesser degree than what we observed for HepG2, a widely used, but poor malaria HCC model. Our analytical approach to understanding the basic biology of HC-04 helps us understand the factors that may influence its utility as a model for malaria liver-stage development. We observed that HC-04 treatment with HGF prior to the addition of Plasmodium falciparum sporozoites did not facilitate cell invasion, arguing for unlinking the effect of HGF on malaria liver stage development from hepatocyte invasion. Finally, our 2D-LC-MS/MS approach and broadly applicable experimental strategy should prove useful in the analysis of various hepatocyte-pathogen interactions, tumor progression and early disease events.
2016-07-20 | MSV000079959 | MassIVE