The potential involvement of the cofactor of BRCA1 in hepatocellular carcinoma pathogenesis

<p>The cofactor of BRCA1 (COBRA1), which also refers to negative elongation factor polypeptide B (NELF-B), is a negative elongation factor (NELF) subunit that has been implicated in the development and progression of several cancers. While reduced COBRA1 expression has been associated with metastatic breast cancer, COBRA1 negatively regulates the activator protein-1 (AP-1) complex, leading to the down-regulation of trefoil factor-1 (TFF1) expression in gastric cancer cell lines. The involvement of COBRA1 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tumor formation and progression is not known. Here, we investigated the expression of COBRA1, the AP-1 complex, and TFF1 in several HCC cell lines; ranging from low- to high-grade HCC cell lines generated from patients with different stages of the disease. Our results showed that the COBRA1 protein was highly expressed in the low-grade HCC cell line, while significantly down-regulated in high-grade HCC cell lines. TFF1, previously regarded as a COBRA1 target gene, was only expressed in the low-grade HCC cell line and the control cells. Our results suggest that COBRA1 may play a role in HCC pathogenesis and progression. The TFF1 mRNA expression profile was uncorrelated to that of the AP-1 complex subunit proteins, which suggests the involvement of other regulatory pathways in TFF1 expression; however, this requires further study.</p>