BACKGROUND Our previous study demonstrated that an up-regulation of the Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) signaling pathway is involved the mechanism causing the recurrence of triple negative breast cancer. The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of commonly used Chinese medicinal herbs on MDA-MB-231 and HUVEC cells and how they interact with BDNF. METHODS Human TNBC MDA-MB...

Abstract Background Anoikis resistance plays a critical role in the tumor metastasis by allowing survival of cancer cells systemic circulation. We previously showed that long non-coding RNAs APOC1P1-3 (lncRNA APOC1P1-3) inhibit apoptosis breast cells. In this study, we explored its anoikis resistance. Methods induced two cell lines (MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231) under anchorage-independent culture cond...

The human tyrosinase gene TYR is a multifunctional reporter gene with potential use in photoacoustic imaging (PAI), positron emission tomography (PET), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). We sought to establish and evaluate a reporter gene system using TYR under the control of the Tet-on gene expression system (gene expression induced by doxycycline [Dox]) as a multimodality imaging agent. We...

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES The present study was conducted to examine the inhibitory effect of loquat leaves on MDA-MB-231 cell proliferation and invasion. MATERIALS/METHODS Female athymic nude mice were given a subcutaneous (s.c.) inoculation of MDA-MB-231 cells and randomly grouped to receive a s.c. injection of either 500 mg/kg ethanol, water extract or vehicle five times a week. Tumor growth, ...

Bone morphogenetic protein 9 (BMP9) possesses multiple functions, but its effects on breast cancer cells in adipose microenvironment are still unclear. This study aimed to investigate whether BMP9 is able to modulate the interaction between pre-adipocytes/adipocytes and breast cancer cells. An in vitro co-culture system was established by using pre-adipocytes/adipocytes and MDA-MB-231 breast ca...

Tumor microenvironmental hypoxia induces hypoxia inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) overexpression, leading to the release of lysyl oxidase (LOX), which crosslinks collagen at distant sites to facilitate environmental changes that allow cancer cells to easily metastasize. Our previous study showed that activation of the P2Y2 receptor (P2Y2R) by ATP released from MDA-MB-231 cells increased MDA-MB-231 ...

Endothelial adhesion is necessary for the hematogenous dissemination of tumor cells. However, the metastatic breast tumor cell MDA-MB-231 does not bind to the endothelium under physiological flow conditions, suggesting alternate mechanisms of adhesion. Since monocytes are highly represented in the tumor microenvironment, and also bind to endothelium during inflammation, we hypothesized that the...

Autologous fat grafting after breast cancer surgery is commonly performed, but concerns about oncologic risk remain. To model the interaction between fat grafting and breast cancer cells, two approaches were employed. In the first approach, graded numbers of viable MDA-MB-231 or BT-474 cells were admixed directly into human fat grafts and injected subcutaneously into immune-deficient mice to de...

Abnormal tumor cell metabolism is a consequence of alterations in signaling pathways that provide critical selective advantage to cancer cells. However, a systematic characterization of the metabolic and signaling pathways altered in cancer stem-like cells (CSCs) is currently lacking. Using nuclear magnetic resonance and mass spectrometry, we profiled the whole-cell metabolites of a pair of par...

Bisphosphonate (BP), a specific inhibitor of osteoclasts, has been widely used as a beneficial agent for the treatment of bone metastases in patients with breast cancer. It is well recognized that BP reduces osteolysis by promoting apoptosis in osteoclasts. However, recent animal and human data suggest that BPs not only reduce osteolysis associated with metastatic breast cancer, but also decrea...