Researchers of the University of Notre Dame (France) have identified, in a study recently published in the journal Nature Communications, two proteins that are considered critical for breast cancer bone metastasis.
Experts have discovered that CXCL5 protein is key to signaling the growth of cancer cells once it binds to its CXCR2 receptor. In this sense, the work has shown that these two proteins cause breast cancer cells, including those that remain inactive, to reproduce and spread rapidly to the bones and bone marrow.
Researchers have also identified the factors that can activate or inhibit breast cancer proliferation, as well as induce latency of cancer cells in the bone. Specifically, the CXCL5 protein was identified as a proliferative factor, although previously its CXCR2 receptor had been linked to poor response to chemotherapy treatment.
Therefore, the authors analyzed how CXCL5 and CXCR2 can work together to increase the proliferation of cancer cells. The team found that when CXCR2 receptor was blocked, CXCL5-induced signaling was inhibited, preventing rapid proliferation of breast cancer cells in the bones.
“Before our study, the idea that CXCL5 and CXCR2 played an essential role in this critical step in bone colonization due to breast cancer had not been explored. Now we have the opportunity to analyze how to inhibit this cellular process could be a goal for future therapies to treat breast cancer metastases or other types of cancer that spread to the bones ”, experts have settled, who have confirmed that CXCL5 and CXCR2 were present in a sample of human bone from a breast cancer patient with bone metastases.