Abstract
Maspin is a novel serine protease inhibitor (serpin) with tumor suppressive activity. To date, despite the mounting evidence implicating the potential diagnostic/prognostic and therapeutic value of maspin in breast and prostate carcinoma, the lack of a suitable animal model hampers the in vivo investigation on the role of maspin at different stages of tumor progression. In this study, we used MMTV/TGF-α transgenic mouse model to study the expression profile of maspin in mammary tumor progression. Histopathological examinations of MMTV/TGF-α transgenic mice revealed TGF-α expression leading to hyperproliferation, hyperplasia, and occasional carcinoma in mammary gland. Interestingly, when MMTV/TGF-α transgenic mice were breed to homozygocity, they also developed characteristic skin papillomas. Immunohistochemistry analysis of maspin expression in the breast tissues of TGF-α transgenic mice showed a direct correlation between down-regulation of maspin expression and tumor progression. The loss of maspin expression was concomitant with the critical transition from carcinoma in situ to invasive carcinoma. Subsequent in-situ hybridization analyses suggest that the down-regulation of maspin expression is primarily a transcriptional event. This data is consistent with the tumor suppressive role of maspin. Furthermore, our data suggests that MMTV/TGF-α transgenic mouse model is advantageous for in vivo evaluation of both the expression and the biological function of maspin during the slow multi-stage carcinogenesis of mammary gland.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported in part by a Prostate Cancer Pilot Grant from National Cancer Institute/Wayne State University CA69845 (to S Sheng), a Ruth Sager Memorial Fund established by Dr Arthur B Pardee (to S Sheng), and by NIH grants CA 64248 and CA 83964 (to KB Reddy).
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Reddy, K., McGowen, R., Schuger, L. et al. Maspin expression inversely correlates with breast tumor progression in MMTV/TGF-alpha transgenic mouse model. Oncogene 20, 6538–6543 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.onc.1204796
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.onc.1204796
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