HIF-1 effects on angiogenic potential in human small cell lung carcinoma

Background: hypoxia-inducible factor-1 alpha (hif-1) maybe an important regulatory factor for angiogenesis of small cell lung cancer (sclc). our study aimed to investigate the effect of hif-1 on angiogenic potential of sclc including two points: one is the effect of hif-1 on the angiogenesis of sclc in vivo. the other is the regulation of angiogenic genes by hif-1 in vitro and in vivo. methods. in vivo we used an alternative method to study the effect of hif-1a on angiogenic potential of sclc by buliding nci-h446 cell transplantation tumor on the chick embryo chorioallantoic membrane (cam) surface. in vitro we used microarray to screen out the angiogenic genes regulated by hif-1a and tested their expression level in cam transplantation tumor by rt-pcr and western-blot analysis. results: in vivo angiogenic response surrounding the sclc transplantation tumors in chick embryo chorioallantoic membrane (cam) was promoted after exogenous hif-1 transduction (p < 0.05). in vitro the changes of angiogenic genes expression induced by hif-1 in nci-h446 cells were analyzed by cdna microarray experiments. hif-1 upregulated the expression of angiogenic genes vegf-a,tnfaip6,pdgfc,fn1,mmp28,mmp14 to 6.76-,6.69-,2.26-,2.31-,4.39-,2.97- fold respectively and glycolytic genes glut1,glut2 to2.98-,3.74- fold respectively. in addition,the expression of these angiogenic factors were also upregulated by hif-1 in the transplantion tumors in cam as rt-pcr and western-blot analysis indicated. conclusions: these results indicated that hif-1 may enhance the angiogenic potential of sclc by regulating some angiogenic genes such as vegf-a,mmp28 etc. therefore,hif-1 may be a potential target for the gene targeted therapy of sclc. © 2011 wan et al; licensee biomed central ltd.