Antitumor activity of recombinant RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion protein in vitro

Zhengwei Wen1, Qunying Jia, Xiaojuan Kang

  • 1aDepartment of Nuclear Medicine, School of Basic Medical Sciences bZhejiang Provincial Key Lab of Medical Genetics cZhejiang Provincial Key Lab for Technology and Application of Model Organisms dInstitute of Medical Virology, School of Laboratory Medicine and Life Science, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou eThe First Hospital of Changsha City, Kaifu District, Changsha, China.

Anti-Cancer Drugs
|October 21, 2016
PubMed

Interferon (IFN) regulates immune responses and antitumor activity. Arginine-glycine-aspartic acid (RGD) peptides can specifically bind to integrin αvβ3, a transmembrane receptor that is highly expressed on the surface of various cancer cells. In this study, we expressed recombinant RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion proteins and assessed their antitumor activity in vitro. Two RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion proteins and a negative control protein were expressed in vitro. These two RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion proteins could bind the tumor cell surface specifically and did not bind to normal cells. RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion protein treatment of tumor cells significantly reduced cell viability and induced apoptosis in a dose-dependent manner. At the 'mRNA' level, both proteins could upregulate CASP3 expression. These data indicate that both laboratory-engineered RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion proteins could bind the surface of tumor cells and induce apoptosis in vitro. Further studies will investigate the in-vivo antitumor activities of the RGD-IFN-α2a-core fusion proteins.

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