Up-regulation of collagen proteins in colorectal liver metastasis compared with normal liver tissue

Changes to extracellular matrix (ECM) structures are linked to tumor cell proliferation and metastasis. We previously reported that naturally occurring peptides of collagen type I are elevated in urine of patients with colorectal liver metastasis (CRLM). In the present study, we took an MS-based proteomic approach to identify specific collagen types that are up-regulated in CRLM tissues compared with healthy, adjacent liver tissues from the same patients. We found that 19 of 22 collagen-α chains are significantly up-regulated (p < 0.05) in CRLM tissues compared with the healthy tissues. At least four collagen-α chains were absent or had low expression in healthy colon and adjacent tissues, but were highly abundant in both colorectal cancer (CRC) and CRLM tissues. This expression pattern was also observed for six noncollagen colon-specific proteins, two of which (CDH17 and PPP1R1B/DARP-32) had not previously been linked to CRLM. Furthermore, we observed CRLM-associated up-regulation of 16 proteins (of 20 associated proteins identified) known to be required for collagen synthesis, indicating increased collagen production in CRLM. Immunohistochemistry validated that collagen type XII is significantly up-regulated in CRLM. The results of this study indicate that most collagen isoforms are up-regulated in CRLM compared with healthy tissues, most likely as a result of an increased collagen production in the metastatic cells. Our findings provide further insight into morphological changes in the ECM in CRLM and help explain the finding of tumor metastasis-associated proteins and peptides in urine, suggesting their utility as metastasis biomarkers.