Human fibrosarcoma cells produce fibronectin-releasing peptides

A sensitive radioimmunoassay, specific for human fibronectin, was used to measure the ability of certain biologically active polypeptides to release fibronectin from cultured human lung fibroblasts into their culture media. Concentrated, serum-free supernatant from a human fibrosarcoma cell line was fractionated by gel filtration chromatography in the presence of acetic acid. Various polypeptides with molecular weights between 46,000 and 6,000 were tested for their ability to release fibronectin from cells. The column fraction, containing polypeptides with an apparent molecular weight of 10,000, exhibited the ability to rapidly release fibronectin from target cells. The activity could be inhibited by phenylmethyl sulphonylfluoride. Several other hormonal factors, tested in parallel with the column fractions, failed to show this effect. The 10,000 dalton molecular weight polypeptides may represent a family of cellular gene products responsible for maintenance of low levels of surface associated fibronectin in fibrosarcoma cells and thus be related to their infiltrating properties by preventing the formation of the extracellular matrix.