Metastasis Factors

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3535534/pdf/ijbsv09p0055.pdf

Currently, I am working on research for a paper, and I have come across this article that I have found somewhat interesting.  For those of you who have taken Histology or are taking the course, you may find this interesting as well.  For the past Histo lecture test we have taken, we've briefly skimmed over the process of metastasis. 

During metastasis of carcinoma (epithelial-derived), altered cell adhesion occurs (cadherens to integrins) along with the release of proteases for basal membrane breakdown.  These actions lead to the invasion of tumor cells into the connective tissue.  Now, the only way for a tumor cells to become malignant is when nutrients via blood vessels are provided to sustain their growth. Thus, the angiogenic factor--encourages blood vessel formation--as well as vascular permeability factor are both released to provide the nutrients  for the tumor cells. (The image is from the Histo ppt. Haha.)

Anyways, all that to say, this article did point out how part of the expressed gene (isoform OPN-c) of osteopontin, another type of cell adhesion protein,  is found, when overexpressed likely due to faulty alternative splicing, to be a contributing cause of metastasis. OPN-c has "availability" to bind to integrin, which is abnormal cell adhesion.  Below is from bottom of first column of page 65:

"However, excision of exon 4 may make OPN-c more soluble and available for integrin receptors, thus resulting in its strong pro-metastatic activity through downstream enhanced signaling."

 

This part just got me a little too excited as you can see... If any of you see any incorrect information from above, please indicate so.  I typed all of this out of excitement without looking everything up to check if the info is accurate.  Anyways, this article has other interesting insights to post-transcriptional processing factor, alternative splicing, and the possible causes of certain cancers.   Enjoy! ;)