1. Rho Kinase Inhibitor Fasudil Suppresses the Vasculogenic Mimicry of B16 Mouse Melanoma Cells Both In Vitro and In Vivo
- Author
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Yun Xia, Fang Zhu, Zhenyu Li, Jinghua Ren, Xian-Yi Cai, Jing Chen, Gang Wu, Ruiguang Zhang, Liling Zhang, and Ji-Quan Fan
- Subjects
Male ,Cancer Research ,RHOA ,Angiogenesis ,Blotting, Western ,Melanoma, Experimental ,Pharmacology ,Cell Movement ,1-(5-Isoquinolinesulfonyl)-2-Methylpiperazine ,Cell Line, Tumor ,Animals ,Humans ,Vasculogenic mimicry ,Protein Kinase Inhibitors ,Cell Proliferation ,Matrigel ,rho-Associated Kinases ,Microscopy, Confocal ,biology ,Neovascularization, Pathologic ,Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction ,Fasudil ,Cell migration ,Tumor Burden ,Endothelial stem cell ,Mice, Inbred C57BL ,Oncology ,Rho kinase inhibitor ,biology.protein ,Cancer research ,Lysophospholipids ,Neoplasm Transplantation - Abstract
The aim of this study was to investigate the biologic role of the Rho kinase inhibitor fasudil in the vasculogenic mimicry (VM) of B16 mouse melanoma cells. It was previously reported that RhoA plays a critical role in angiogenesis by coordinating endothelial cell cytoskeleton remodeling and promoting endothelial cell motility. Although RhoA has been implicated in the regulation of angiogenesis, little has been described regarding its control of these tumor cell–lined channels. In this study, we established an in vitro model of VM using 3-dimensional cell culturing of mouse B16 melanoma cells and studied VM in vivo by transplanting B16 cells into C57/BL mice. Next, we explored the effect of RhoA and Rho-associated, coiled-coil containing protein kinase (ROCK) on VM formation using the Rho kinase inhibitor fasudil. We provide direct evidence that fasudil leads to reduced vascular-like channels in Matrigel. Additional experiments suggested that fasudil prevents both initial cellular architecture changes and cell migration in vitro. Finally, we provide in-depth evidence for the underlying mechanisms of fasudil-induced VM destruction using the Rho-GTPase agonist lysophosphatidic acid. In vivo studies revealed that fasudil reduced B16 melanoma cell xenograft tumor growth without causing significant toxicity in mice. Fasudil-treated tumors also displayed fewer VM channels. These results suggest that fasudil may be an emerging therapeutic option for targeting cancer VM. Mol Cancer Ther; 14(7); 1582–90. ©2015 AACR.
- Published
- 2014