News Release

Heparanase-specific shRNA: A novel therapeutic strategy in human gastric cancer

Peer-Reviewed Publication

World Journal of Gastroenterology

Previous studies have indicated that the heparanase (HPA) is correlated with histopathological parameters and poor prognosis of gastric cancers. Although their efficiencies in inhibiting the expression of HPA, the traditional HPA inhibitors may produce nonspecific and undesirable effects. In recent years, genetic approaches targeting HPA have been regarded as a promising alternative. Antisense oligonucleotides, ribozyme, and small RNA interference (siRNA) have been developed to decrease the HPA expression. However, it remains unknown whether stable transfection of short hairpin RNA (shRNA) can knockdown the HPA expression and decrease the invasiveness and metastasis of gastric cancer cells.

A research team from China reported such research examining the effects of HPA-specific shRNA on the cultured gastric cancer cells. Results showed that stable transfection of HPA-specific shRNA, but not of scrambled shRNA and mock vector, resulted in reduced mRNA and protein levels of HPA. The shRNA-mediated knockdown of HPA did not affect the cellular proliferation of SGC-7901 cells. However, the in vitro invasiveness and metastasis of cancer cells were decreased after knockdown of HPA. Moreover, transfection of HPA-specific shRNA decreased the in vitro angiogenesis capabilities of SGC-7901 cells. Their study was published on November 21, 2009 in the World Journal of Gastroenterology.

Their research suggested that HPA-specific shRNA may be of potential value as a novel therapeutic strategy in human gastric cancer and may be also applicable for the therapies of other cancers overexpressing HPA.

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Reference: Zheng LD, Jiang GS, Pu JR, Mei H, Dong JH, Hou XH, Tong QS. Stable knockdown of heparanase expression in gastric cancer cells in vitro. World J Gastroenterol 2009; 15(43): 5442-5448

http://www.wjgnet.com/1007-9327/15/5442.asp

Correspondence to: Dr. Qiang-Song Tong, Department of Surgery, Union Hospital of Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430022, Hubei Province, China.

qs_tong@hotmail.com

Telephone: +86-27-63776478 Fax: +86-27-85726197

About World Journal of Gastroenterology

World Journal of Gastroenterology (WJG), a leading international journal in gastroenterology and hepatology, has established a reputation for publishing first class research on esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, viral hepatitis, colorectal cancer, and H. pylori infection and provides a forum for both clinicians and scientists. WJG has been indexed and abstracted in Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch) and Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition, Index Medicus, MEDLINE and PubMed, Chemical Abstracts, EMBASE/Excerpta Medica, Abstracts Journals, Nature Clinical Practice Gastroenterology and Hepatology, CAB Abstracts and Global Health. ISI JCR 2008 IF: 2.081. WJG is a weekly journal published by WJG Press. The publication dates are the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th day of every month. WJG is supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 30224801 and No. 30424812, and was founded with the name of China National Journal of New Gastroenterology on October 1, 1995, and renamed WJG on January 25, 1998.


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