Basic Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jun 21, 2023; 29(23): 3606-3621
Published online Jun 21, 2023. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v29.i23.3606
BMI-1 activates hepatic stellate cells to promote the epithelial-mesenchymal transition of colorectal cancer cells
Zhong-Yang Jiang, Xi-Mei Ma, Xiao-Hui Luan, Zhen-Yu Liuyang, Yi-Yang Hong, Yuan Dai, Qing-Hua Dong, Guan-Yu Wang
Zhong-Yang Jiang, Xiao-Hui Luan, Zhen-Yu Liuyang, Guan-Yu Wang, Department of General Surgery, Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310016, Zhejiang Province, China
Xi-Mei Ma, Department of Emergency, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Zhejing University, Hangzhou 310016, Zhejiang Province, China
Yi-Yang Hong, Yuan Dai, Qing-Hua Dong, Biomedical Research Center, Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310016, Zhejiang Province, China
Qing-Hua Dong, Key Laboratory of Cancer Prevention and Intervention, China National Ministry of Education, Hangzhou 310009, Zhejiang Province, China
Author contributions: Jiang ZY, Dong QH, and Wang GY conceived and designed the study; Jiang ZY, Ma XM, Luan XH, Liuyang ZY, Hong YY, and Dai Y performed the research, and collected and analyzed the data; Jiang ZY, Dong QH, and Wang GY wrote the manuscript; All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 81472213; the Health Commission of Zhejiang Province, No. 2019ZD010 and No. 2019ZD029; the Science Technology Department of Zhejiang Province, No. LGF20H220001; and the Zhejiang Provincial Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, No. 2021ZA088.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital affiliated with the Zhejiang University School of Medicine, No. 2023-404-01.
Institutional animal care and use committee statement: All animal experiments were performed in accordance with the guidelines of the Committee on the Ethics of Animal Experiments of Zhejiang University, No. ZJU20220447.
Informed consent statement: All study participants or their legal guardian provided informed written consent about personal and medical data collection prior to study enrolment.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
ARRIVE guidelines statement: The authors have read the ARRIVE guidelines, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the ARRIVE guidelines.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (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: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Guan-Yu Wang, MD, PhD, Surgeon, Department of General Surgery, Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, No. 3 East Qingchun Road, Hangzhou 310016, Zhejiang Province, China. wangguanyu@zju.edu.cn
Received: February 1, 2023
Peer-review started: February 1, 2023
First decision: February 12, 2023
Revised: February 25, 2023
Accepted: May 4, 2023
Article in press: May 4, 2023
Published online: June 21, 2023
Processing time: 135 Days and 3.3 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: This study revealed that BMI-1 was upregulated in liver cells during colorectal cancer (CRC) liver metastasis. BMI-1-activated LX2 hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) promoted CRC cell proliferation, migration, and the epithelial-mesenchymal transition both in vitro and in vivo. Mechanistically, transforming growth factor beta 1 was increased in BMI-1 overexpressed LX2 HSCs, and triggered the phosphorylation of downstream SMAD2/3 in CRC cells and the interaction of activated HSCs and CRC cells, thereby further promoting CRC progression.