Early Cell Cultures from Prostate Cancer Tissue Express Tissue Specific Epithelial and Cancer Markers.

Prostate cancer (PCa) is a widespread oncological disease that proceeds in the indolent form in most patients. However, in some cases, the indolent form can transform into aggressive metastatic incurable cancer. The most important task of PCa diagnostics is to search for early markers that can be used for predicting the transition of indolent cancer into its aggressive form. Currently, there are two effective preclinical models to study PCa pathogenesis: patients derived xenografts (PDXs) and patients derived organoids (PDOs). Both models have limitations that restrict their use in research. In this work, we investigated the ability of the primary 2D prostate cell cultures (PCCs) from PCa patients to express epithelial and cancer markers. Early PCCs were formed by epithelial cells that were progressively replaced with the fibroblast-like cells. Early PCCs contained tissue-specific stem cells that could grow in a 3D culture and form PDOs similar to those produced from the prostate tissue. Early PCCs and PDOs derived from the tissues of PCa patients expressed prostate basal and luminal epithelial markers, as well as cancer markers AMACR, TMPRSS2-ERG, and EZH2, the latter being a promising candidate to mark the transition from the indolent to aggressive PCa. We also identified various TMPRSS2-ERG fusion transcripts in PCCs and PDOs, including new chimeric variants resulting from the intra- and interchromosomal translocations. The results suggest that early PCCs derived from cancerous and normal prostate tissues sustain the phenotype of prostate cells and can be used as a preclinical model to study the pathogenesis of PCa.

Preparation and characterization of the antibody recognizing AMACR inside its catalytic center.

Alpha-methylacyl-CoA racemase (AMACR) catalyzes the ß-oxidation of fatty acids and is overexpressed in carcinomas in various organs, while its inactivation results in the inhibition of cancer growth. In the present study, we prepared and characterized 20 different mouse monoclonal antibodies against human AMACR. In the course of biopanning of a phage peptide commercial library against in-house prepared 6H9 and 2A5, and commercial 13H4 antibodies, 10 phage mimotopes recognized by each type of the antibody were selected. Using the program Pepitope and the crystal structure of AMACR from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, we reveal for the first time, at least to the best of our knowledge, that the epitopes recognizing the antibody against AMACR are composed of conformation sequences localized inside the AMACR catalytic center. When delivered into live HeLa cells using cationic lipid-based PULSin reagent, the specific antibodies against AMACR were co-localized with peroxisomes. The in-house made 6H9 antibody exhibited a low level of this co-localization compared to the commercially available 63340 antibody, and did not inhibit the growth rate of HeLa and T98G cells. The results obtained suggest that antibody against AMACR may possess anti-AMACR catalytic activity and needs to be further investigated as a potential drug for use in anticancer therapy. On the whole, in this study, we generated several clones of AMACR antibodies and demonstrated that these antibodies can be colonized into live cells. Currently, we are testing the growth inhibitory properties of these antibodies against AMACR.

Lung epithelial cells induce endodermal differentiation in mouse mesenchymal bone marrow stem cells by paracrine mechanism.

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) from bone marrow are a potential source for reconstructive therapy. In vitro, MSCs differentiate into cells of mesodermal and ectodermal lineages but rarely into cells of endodermal lineage. We developed an in vitro model to study the endodermal differentiation of MSCs using co-culture of MSCs and transformed lung epithelial (A-549) cells. The cells were separated using a cell-impermeable membrane to eliminate the possibility of cell fusion. Under these conditions, MSCs expressed several lung epithelial markers (cytokeratins 5, 8, 14, 18, 19, pro-surfactant protein C, zonula occludens-1), detected using quantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction and Western blot, and beta-catenin signaling was activated in MSCs. Treatment of MSCs with 10 to 20 mM lithium chloride activated the beta-catenin pathway and enhanced expression of epithelial markers, although this activation was transient. We conclude that A-549 cells can trigger epithelial differentiation of MSCs by a paracrine mechanism that may include activation of beta-catenin signaling.