Chronic Inflammation May Lead to Cancer Metastasis

New study reveals a detailed epigenetic mechanism for how interleukin-1-beta, a common cytokine that helps fight infections during inflammation, plays a critical role in cancer metastasis.

Prolonged exposure to interleukin-1-beta can promote lung cancer metastasis through changes of gene expression without changing DNA sequence. Due to these gene modifications, cancer cells can memorize epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition, a vital step during cancer metastasis to reach distance organs and subsequently colonize.

BACKGROUND

‘Better knowledge about the role of interleukin-1-beta-induced chronic inflammation could contribute to the improvement of the prevention and treatment of lung cancer.’
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Lung cancer remains the most lethal cancer type in the United States. The vast majority of people with lung cancer die from tumor reoccurrence or metastasis. Therefore, one of the biggest challenges in treating cancer is stopping it from metastasizing to other parts of the body.

Scientists have known that chronic inflammation facilities tumor progression, but how this process leads to the spread of cancer is not well elucidated.

Previous research has showed interleukin-1-beta is correlated with poor survival in people with non-small cell lung cancer and exposure of this cytokine prompts the expression of genes that are often involved in invasion during metastasis in multiple cancers.

New Ways to Treat Chronic Inflammation Identified
New study highlights a more efficient way of reducing the effect of a group of transmitter substances (cytokines) in the immune system known as IL-1 family. This could pave the way for developing new treatments for chronic inflammatory diseases such as psoriasis, asthma, and HIV.

The UCLA team enhanced the understanding of the process by studying the role of chronic interleukin-1-beta exposure in the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition.

METHOD

The researchers investigated the role of interleukin-1-beta in lung cancer metastasis by looking at in vitro models of lung cancer to help provide insight into the cells' behaviors. They specifically examined whether interleukin-1-beta induced epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition in lung cancer cells.

The team detailed the mechanism by analyzing the different cell lines to see if there were cellular signaling and protein interactions that would lead to the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition phenotype. About 30% of the cell lines showed signaling of the memory phenotype, confirming that the mechanism is one of pathways that promote cancer metastasis.

IMPACT

The study furthers researchers' understanding of the role of interleukin-1-beta-induced chronic inflammation in tumor progressions and metastasis, which can potentially contribute to the improvement of both the prevention and treatment of lung cancer.

Source-Eurekalert