Neutrophils and cancers

Oncological diseases remain the most important problem of medicine. Causes of cancer, essence of cells malignant transformation process is not revealed, mechanisms of occurrence and development of cancer diseases are not determined. Recent studies show neutrophils are found in close proximity to tumor cells. The provision that neutrophils can be really important cells in human cancer development is detail discussed.

The aim of the study was based on literature data and the results of our own studies develop a concept to explain and evaluate the role of neutrophils in oncogenesis.

Analysis of modern foreign and domestic literature, the results of our earlier numerous experiments in vivo and in vitro was conducted. Experiments were performed on 12 outbreed male rats weighing 190-215 g in compliance with the EU Directive 2010/63/ EU for animal experiments. The wounds were made under ether anesthesia by excision in the interscapular region of the skin with subcutaneous fiber an area of 300 mm2. The reaction of cells was studied in dynamics from the moment of wound application to their healing by smears-prints taken from the wound surface according to the method proposed by M.P. Pokrovskaya and M.S. Makarov. In order to obtain more reliable information about the dynamics of cell change in the wound, cytological studies of the same wound were carried out repeatedly during the day.

Large number of cells was found on the wound surface, the bulk of which were neutrophils. After 1-2 hours, no morphologically normal cells could be detected in the preparations. Against the background of the small pink-violet granularity, which covered the entire specimen, it was possible to see only single nuclei with indistinct contours for several fields of view. By 4 hours, the granularity formed as a result of the leukocytes disintegration increased in size, rounded, turning into bodies of spherical or oval shape of different diameters: from 1 to 5-7 μm, stained according to Romanovsky in the color of nuclear material. After 6-8 hours, the growth of spherical bodies continued. Their number also increased. Were noted many clusters of nuclear matter in the form of irregular shapes of large sizes. Smaller graininess was also retained. With an increase in the volume of spherical bodies, the following changes are possible. In the process of neutrophil cultivation, we were able to obtain data shedding additional light on the process of neutrophils transformation into poorly differentiated cells. It was shown that during the three-day cultivation, the total number of cells detected in the preparations increases, although to a much lesser extent than could be expected, based on the number of separated segments of neutrophil nuclei.

It is highly probable that the cause of the cancer cells appearance in the human body lies in the reaction of neutrophils involved in inflammatory regeneration in response to the damaging effect of oncogenes, which may be various physical, chemical, biological factors, namely the ability of neutrophils to dedifferentiate.