Studies of type IV collagenase regulation by hypoxia.
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Recent data suggest that patients with more hypoxic solid tumors are more likely to develop metastases and die. We speculated that upregulation of the metastasis-associated type IV collagenase MMP-9 (gelatinase B) by hypoxia might be correlated with the increased risk of distant failure in patients with hypoxic tumors. The promoter for MMP-9 contains consensus binding sites for the transcription factors NFkappaB and AP-1 which are upregulated under hypoxic conditions in HeLa cells and these transcription factors are critical to transcriptional activation of the MMP-9 gene. A variety of tumor cell lines were examined for induction of MMP-9 and the related protease MMP-2 under hypoxic conditions. Although hypoxia did upregulate MMP-9 in one alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma cell line, we were unable to demonstrate a consistent hypoxia-mediated increase in MMP-9 protein, RNA, or transcriptional activity measured with reporter constructs. These results suggest that MMP-9 expression is not directly affected by exposure to hypoxia in vitro.