Abstract
Epidemiological studies have indicated that obesity is associated with colorectal cancer. The obesity hormone leptin is considered as a key mediator for cancer development and progression. The present study aims to investigate regulatory effects of leptin on colorectal carcinoma. The expression of leptin and its receptor Ob-R was examined by immunohistochemistry in 108 Chinese patients with colorectal carcinoma. The results showed that leptin/Ob-R expression was significantly associated with T stage, TNM stage, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, differentiation and expression of p-mTOR, p-70S6 kinase, and p-Akt. Furthermore, the effects of leptin on proliferation and apoptosis of HCT-116 colon carcinoma cells were determined. The results showed that leptin could stimulate the proliferation and inhibit the apoptosis of HCT-116 colon cells through the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway. Ly294002 (a PI3K inhibitor) and rapamycin (an mTOR inhibitor) could prevent the regulatory effects of leptin on the proliferation and apoptosis of HCT-116 cells via abrogating leptin-mediated PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway. All these results indicated that leptin could regulate proliferation and apoptosis of colorectal carcinoma through the PI3K/Akt/mTOR signalling pathway.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Jiajia Wang for excellent technical assistance and Fengjie Guo for figure preparation. We also thank Jia-Jia Wang for critical and constructive reading of the manuscript. This work was supported by the Grant from Science and Technology Agency of Hunan Province, No.2010SK3179
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[Wang D, Chen J, Chen H, Duan Z, Xu Q, Wei M, Wang L and Zhong M 2012 Leptin regulates proliferation and apoptosis of colorectal carcinoma through PI3K/Akt/mTOR signalling pathway. J. Biosci. 37 XXX–XXX] DOI
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Wang, D., Chen, J., Chen, H. et al. Leptin regulates proliferation and apoptosis of colorectal carcinoma through PI3K/Akt/mTOR signalling pathway. J Biosci 37, 91–101 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12038-011-9172-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12038-011-9172-4