Macrophage migration inhibitory factor regulating the expression of VEGF-C through MAPK signal pathways in breast cancer MCF-7 cell

作者:Zhang, Jinnan; Zhang, Guangbo; Yang, Sumei; Qiao, Junli; Li, Taixun; Yang, Song; Hong, Yong*
来源:World Journal of Surgical Oncology, 2016, 14(1): 51.
DOI:10.1186/s12957-016-0797-5

摘要

Background: As a kind of versatility of cytokines, overexpression of macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) and vascular endothelial growth factor-C (VEGF-C) have been reported in a wide variety of tumors. However, the correlation and mechanism between MIF and VEGF-C are still not clear. As an important signal transduction system, MAPK signaling pathways participate in a variety of biological behavior of cells. The purposes of this study are to study the relationship between MIF and VEGF-C and discuss the role of MAPK signal pathway in the relationship. Methods: In this study, we first knocked down the MIF using small interfering RNA (siRNA) and built the stable low expression MIF breast cancer cells (siRNA-MIF-MCF-7) and the negative control cells (siRNA-NC-MCF-7). And then, we evaluated the expression of MIF using Western blot to confirm the effect of transfection. Using real-time fluorescent quantitative polymerase chain reaction and enzyme-linked immunosorbent experiment, we respectively examined the different expression of VEGF-C between siRNA-MIF-MCF-7 and siRNA-NC-MCF-7 and breast cancer cells MCF-7. Moreover, we investigated the expression of p38 MAPK, P-p38 MAPK, p44/42 MAPK, and P-p44/42 MAPK in the three kinds of cells by Western blot to analyze the regulatory mechanism to VEGF-C. Results: We found that MIF siRNA markedly reduced the expression of MIF. And the expression level of VEGF-C, p38 MAPK, P-p38-MAPK, p44/42-MAPK, and P-p44/42 MAPK in siRNA-MIF-MCF-7 cells had different degree of decrease compared with siRNA-NC-MCF-7 cells and MCF-7 cells. Conclusions: These results suggest that MIF can regulate the expression of VEGF-C in breast cancer cells. And its regulatory mechanism may work by activating the MAPK signaling pathway.