An In Vitro and In Vivo Evidence That Downregulation of Leukemia Inhibitory Factor (LIF) Receptor (LIF-R) Decreases the Metastatic Potential of Human Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) Cells.

Abstract

Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) and skeletal muscle-derived tumors frequently infiltrate bone marrow (BM). We have demonstrated that the stromal-derived factor (SDF)-1-CXCR4 receptor (Blood 2002; 100:2597) and hepatocyte growth factor (HGF)-c-Met receptor (Cancer Res. 2003;63:7926) play an important role in RMS metastasis to BM. Leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF) is a well known factor that plays an important role in skeletal muscle development/regeneration and similarly as SDF-1 and HGF is secreted by BM stroma. This prompted us to examine whether the LIF-LIF receptor (LIF-R) axis affects the biology/metastasis of RMS cells. We employed in our studies, human established RMS cell lines, as well as RMS samples isolated from patients and noticed that LIF-R was expressed not only on established human RMS cell lines (7/7) but more importantly, it was also detectable in patient samples (23/23). We also found that in RMS cells LIF stimulatesphosphorylation of MAPKp42/44, AKT and STAT3,chemotaxis and adhesion andincreases resistance to cytostatics (e.g., etoposide).These LIF-mediated effects were inhibited after downregulating the LIF-R by siRNA. To learn more on the biological significance of the LIF-LIF-R axis in vivo we employed two models. First, human RMS cells (RH-30) were exposed or not exposed to LIF-R siRNA and subsequently injected into SCID™-Beige immunodeficient mice. To estimate the number of RMS cells that seed to BM and liver in these animals, we isolated DNA and using real- time RT-PCR, amplified human a-satellite sequences and murine b-actin. The number of human cells present in murine organs was subsequently calculated from a standard curve derived from mixing varying numbers of human cells with a constant number of murine cells. We noticed that downregulation of LIF-R by siRNA significantly decreased the number of human RMS cells in murine BM and liver (x4 and x2 respectively). In a second model, the RH30 cell line was selected by repetitive chemotaxis for cells that are highly responsive to LIF (RH-30 L) and subsequently the cells from parental RH-30 cell line and RH-30 L cells were injected intramuscularly. Six weeks after tumour inoculation, we detected more metastasis in bone marrow and lungs in mice injected with RH-30L cells as compared to parental RH-30 clone (x6 and x3 respectively). In conclusion, we present evidence for the first time that the inhibition of LIF-LIF-R axis may decrease the invasive potential of human RMS both in vitro and in vivo. Hence, molecular targeting of LIF-LIF-R axis could possibly become a more effective new strategy to control the progression and metastasis of RMS.