Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2017. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Sep 28, 2017; 23(36): 6639-6649
Published online Sep 28, 2017. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v23.i36.6639
Attenuation of MET-mediated migration and invasion in hepatocellular carcinoma cells by SOCS1
Yirui Gui, Md Gulam Musawwir Khan, Diwakar Bobbala, Claire Dubois, Sheela Ramanathan, Caroline Saucier, Subburaj Ilangumaran
Yirui Gui, Md Gulam Musawwir Khan, Diwakar Bobbala, Claire Dubois, Sheela Ramanathan, Subburaj Ilangumaran, Department of Pediatrics, Immunology Division, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Québec J1H 5N4, Canada
Caroline Saucier, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Québec J1H 5N4, Canada
Author contributions: Gui Y, Bobbala D and Khan MGM performed experiments; Dubois C helped with the 3D-invasion assay and data analysis; Ramanathan S generated cell lines and provided mice; Saucier C helped with experiments, participated in data analysis and manuscript preparation; Gui Y, Saucier C and Ilangumaran S designed the study and wrote the manuscript; Saucier C and Ilangumaran S share senior authorship.
Supported by the Cancer Research Society, Montreal, Canada, No. 16195.
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: Tumor growth studies in mice were carried out under protocols approved by the Université de Sherbrooke ethics committee in accordance with Canadian Council on Animal Care guidelines (Protocol number 226-13B).
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors do not have any conflicts of interest to disclose.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Subburaj Ilangumaran, PhD, Department of Pediatrics, Immunology Division, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Sherbrooke, 3001 North 12th avenue, Sherbrooke, Québec J1H 5N4, Canada. subburaj.ilangumaran@Usherbrooke.ca
Telephone: +1-819-3461110-14834 Fax: +1-819-5645215
Received: March 1, 2017
Peer-review started: March 2, 2017
First decision: April 21, 2017
Revised: May 9, 2017
Accepted: July 4, 2017
Article in press: July 4, 2017
Published online: September 28, 2017
Core Tip

Core tip: The suppressor of cytokine signaling 1 (SOCS1) gene is frequently repressed in primary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) specimens, and mice lacking SOCS1 are highly susceptible to experimental HCC. The tumor suppressor functions of SOCS1 in HCC are not yet fully understood. We have shown that SOCS1 regulates hepatocyte growth factor signaling via the MET receptor in HCC cells and inhibits their growth. In this study, we characterize SOCS1 as a regulator of MET-mediated migration and invasion of HCC cells. We propose that SOCS1 gene expression status could be exploited as a selection marker for precision therapies targeting MET in HCC.