GRWD1 Over-Expression Promotes Gastric Cancer Progression by Activating Notch Signaling Pathway via Up-Regulation of ADAM17.

BACKGROUND: Glutamate-rich WD repeat containing 1 (GRWD1) is over-expressed in a variety of malignant tumors and is considered to be a potential oncogene. However, its mechanism of action in gastric cancer (GC) is still unclear. METHODS: Data analysis, Immunohistochemistry, and Western Blot (WB) were performed to verify the expression of GRWD1 in GC and para-cancerous tissues. The association between GRWD1 expression and tumor size, tissue differentiation, lymph node metastasis, TNM stage, and prognosis was analyzed according to the high and low expression levels of GRWD1. The relationship between GRWD1 and Notch pathway was verified by data analysis and WB. The effects of GRWD1 on the proliferation, migration, and invasion of GC cells were verified by cell proliferation, migration, and invasion assays. We confirmed that the high expression of GRWD1 promoted the proliferation of GC cells in vivo through the tumor formation assay in nude mice. RESULTS: The expression of GRWD1 was higher in GC tissues than in para-cancerous tissues, and its expression was positively correlated with tumor size, lymph node metastasis, and TNM stage, but negatively correlated with differentiation grade and prognosis. GRWD1 over-expression increased ADAM metallopeptidase domain 17 (ADAM17) expression and promoted Notch1 intracellular domain (NICD) release to promote GC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion in vitro. Results from animal studies have shown that high GRWD1 expression could promote GC cell proliferation in vivo by activating the Notch signaling pathway. CONCLUSION: GRWD1 promotes GC progression through ADAM17-dependent Notch signaling, and GRWD1 may be a novel tumor marker and therapeutic target.

Downregulated KDM6A mediates gastric carcinogenesis via Wnt/ß-catenin signaling pathway mediated epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition.

This study explored the connection between KDM6A expression and patient prognosis and the mechanism of KDM6A's role in developing GC (GC). From the immunohistochemical Analysis of 107 GC patients' tumors, we discovered that patients with reduced KDM6A expression had a shorter survival time. There was a correlation between KDM6A expression and the degree of differentiation of tumor tissue, T stage, N stage, and TNM stage. KDM6A gene expression was positively connected with the expression level of E-cadherin and negatively connected with the expression level of N-cadherin and vimentin in vitro tests. KDM6A gene suppression prevented GC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion, whereas high KDM6A gene expression promoted these processes. Second, low expression of KDM6A down-regulates GSK3ß, p-GSK3ß, up-regulates C-Myc, CyclinD1, and promotes ß-catenin protein expression in the nucleus, while the high expression does the opposite. Then, we used ICG001 to block the Wnt/ß-catenin signal transduction pathway, and the results revealed that ICG001 could reduce the promoting effect of low KDM6A expression on aggressiveness and EMT in GC cells. KDM6A down-regulation stimulates the proliferation of GC cells, while ICG001 reverses this action in vivo tests. Patients whose KDM6A expression was found to be low had a poor prognosis, as this study found. The EMT is inhibited by regulating theWnt/ß-catenin signaling by KDM6A, which reduces GC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion. KDM6A may be a viable target for GC in clinical therapy.

Spatial transcriptomics atlas reveals the crosstalk between cancer-associated fibroblasts and tumor microenvironment components in colorectal cancer.

BACKGROUND: The tumor-promoting role of tumor microenvironment (TME) in colorectal cancer has been widely investigated in cancer biology. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs), as the main stromal component in TME, play an important role in promoting tumor progression and metastasis. Hence, we explored the crosstalk between CAFs and microenvironment in the pathogenesis of colorectal cancer in order to provide basis for precision therapy. METHODS: We integrated spatial transcriptomics (ST) and bulk-RNA sequencing datasets to explore the functions of CAFs in the microenvironment of CRC. In detail, single sample gene set enrichment analysis (ssGSEA), gene set variation analysis (GSVA), pseudotime analysis and cell proportion analysis were utilized to identify the cell types and functions of each cell cluster. Immunofluorescence and immunohistochemistry were applied to confirm the results based on bioinformatics analysis. RESULTS: We profiled the tumor heterogeneity landscape and identified two distinct types of CAFs, which myo-cancer-associated fibroblasts (mCAFs) is associated with myofibroblast-like cells and inflammatory-cancer-associated fibroblasts (iCAFs) is related to immune inflammation. When we carried out functional analysis of two types of CAFs, we uncovered an extensive crosstalk between iCAFs and stromal components in TME to promote tumor progression and metastasis. Noticeable, some anti-tumor immune cells such as NK cells, monocytes were significantly reduced in iCAFs-enriched cluster. Then, ssGSEA analysis results showed that iCAFs were related to EMT, lipid metabolism and bile acid metabolism etc. Besides, when we explored the relationship of chemotherapy and microenvironment, we detected that iCAFs influenced immunosuppressive cells and lipid metabolism reprogramming in patient who underwent chemotherapy. Additionally, we identified the clinical role of iCAFs through a public database and confirmed it were related to poor prognosis. CONCLUSIONS: In summary, we identified two types of CAFs using integrated data and explored their functional significance in TME. This in-depth understanding of CAFs in microenvironment may help us to elucidate its cancer-promoting functions and offer hints for therapeutic studies.