Relationship Between Oral Cancer Progression and Cholesterol: Cholesterol Increases Oral Cancer Cell Motility

April 12, 2023

A research group of Nyein Nyein Chan (graduate student) at the Niigata University Graduate School of Medical and Dental Sciences, and Associate Professor YAMAZAKI Manabu and Professor TANUMA Jun-ichi in the Division of Oral Pathology at the same school, discovered that increased cholesterol in cancer cells promotes oral cancer progression. This discovery is expected to advance basic research toward developing new treatments to suppress the progression of oral cancer.
The results of this research were published online in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences on March 23, 2023.

Research results

  • Oral cancer cells exhibited an asymmetric morphology and increased motility when the intracellular cholesterol level was increased.
  • Caveolin-11, a cholesterol-binding protein, was localized at one side of the cholesterol-supplemented cells, which was thought to induce asymmetric cell morphology.
  • Histopathological examination of oral cancer tissues revealed that tumors with high caveolin-1 expression on the plasma membrane had higher rates of postoperative recurrence and/or lymph node metastasis.
  • Prospects for developing a new therapy that targets intracellular cholesterol in cancer cells are expected.
Glossary

1. Caveolin 1
A protein involved in the formation of caveolae, a small invagination of the plasma membrane. This protein can bind cholesterol and is involved in intracellular cholesterol transport.

Publication Details

Journal: International Journal of Molecular Sciences
Title:Cholesterol Is a Regulator of CAV1 Localization and Cell Migration in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma
Authors:Nyein Nyein Chan, Manabu Yamazaki*, Satoshi Maruyama, Tatsuya Abé, Kenta Haga, Masami Kawaharada, Kenji Izumi, Tadaharu Kobayashi and Jun-ichi Tanuma
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
doi: 10.3390/ijms24076035

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