It is found that the canceration of visceral epithelial cells is related to a protein

A team led by Professor Kikuchi Zhang of Osaka University in Japan recently announced that they found that cancer cells on the surface of the large intestine and lung were related to a unique protein Animal experiments have shown that if the protein is not allowed to work, the tumor will become smaller The discovery will help to develop new cancer drugs Epithelial cells on the surface of digestive organs and lungs play an important role in digestion, absorption and exchange of oxygen However, epithelial cells are easy to contact with foreign body stimulation from outside, and are prone to cancer Epithelial cell carcinoma accounts for 80% to 90% of all cancers A protein in the body called FGF (fibroblast growth factor) promotes cell proliferation, while a protein called Wnt3a is involved in development The researchers first took the epithelial cells from the intestine of the rats and cultured them, then added the two proteins to the globular tissue formed by the epithelial cells This tiny tissue should usually remain globular, but when these two proteins are added, they begin to elongate and proliferate into tubular structures Furthermore, the tubular structure began to secrete a large amount of protein called arl4c This situation is similar to the changes of epithelial cell proliferation and metastasis in patients with colorectal cancer and lung cancer The researchers analyzed the tissue removed from the patient's tumor and found that 50% of colorectal cancer patients and 80% of lung cancer patients had arl4c protein in their tumor tissue They transplanted human lung cancer cells into mice, and then reduced the secretion of arl4c protein through gene manipulation Four weeks later, the tumor size in the mice was halved The team has found a gene fragment that blocks the production of arl4c protein and believes that it is possible to develop new drugs for cancer treatment They are currently working with pharmaceutical companies to achieve the goal of new drug research and development as soon as possible (reporter LAN Jianzhong)