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Updated: Jun 9, 2026

Molecular Analysis of Endothelial-mesenchymal Transition Induced by Transforming Growth Factor-β Signaling
Published on: August 3, 2018
Cell migration-promoting and apoptosis-inhibiting activities of Bm-TFF2 require distinct structure basis
Guoyu Yu1, Yong Zhang, Yang Xiang
1Key Laboratory of Animal Models and Human Disease Mechanisms of the Chinese Academy of Sciences & Yunnan Province, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, Yunnan 650223, China.
Abstract:
Human trefoil factors (TFFs) play an important role in wound healing, epithelial restitution and anti-inflammatory effects in the gastrointestinal tract by stimulating cell migration and inhibiting cell apoptosis. In our previous study, Bm-TFF2, an amphibian trefoil factor, which is isolated from the skin secretions of frog Bombina maxima, has much stronger activities than human TFFs. We believe that the expression of the recombinant Bm-TFF2 in vitro is useful to decipher its role in amphibian skin repair. Bm-TFF2 contains 12 cysteine residues and has two TFF-domains. In this study, we expressed full-length of Bm-TFF2 and its single-domain truncations (Bm-TFF2-D1 and Bm-TFF2-D2, each contains a single TFF-domain of Bm-TFF2). The recombinant proteins, including full-length and its single-domain truncations of Bm-TFF2, can promote the migration of human epithelial AGS cells and wound healing of rat intestinal epithelial IEC-6 cells. However, only the full-length of Bm-TFF2, but not its single-domain truncations, can inhibit ceramide-induced apoptosis in AGS cells. In summary, it is the first time to use the recombinant Bm-TFF2 and its truncations to investigate its structure-function relationship. And we report that full-length and each domain of Bm-TFF2 can induce cell migration but only the full-length of Bm-TFF2 can suppress apoptosis, indicating that cell migration-promoting and apoptosis-inhibiting activities of Bm-TFF2 require distinct structure basis.
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