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Pilot Study on “Pericytic Mimicry” and Potential Embryonic/Stem Cell Properties of Angiotropic Melanoma Cells Interacting with the Abluminal Vascular Surface

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Cancer Microenvironment

Abstract

The interaction of tumor cells with the tumor vasculature is mainly studied for its role in tumor angiogenesis and intravascular metastasis of circulating tumor cells. In addition, a specific interaction of tumor cells with the abluminal surfaces of vessels, or angiotropism, may promote the migration of angiotropic tumor cells along the abluminal vascular surfaces in a pericytic location. This process has been termed extravascular migratory metastasis. The abluminal vascular surface may also provide a vascular niche inducing or sustaining stemness to angiotropic tumor cells. This pilot study investigated if angiotropic melanoma cells might represent a subset population with pericytic and embryonic or stem cell properties. Through microarray analysis, we showed that the interaction between melanoma cells and the abluminal surface of endothelial cells triggers significant differential expression of several genes. The most significantly differentially expressed genes have demonstrated properties linked to cancer cell migration (CCL2, ICAM1 and IL6), cancer progression (CCL2, ICAM1, SELE, TRAF1, IL6, SERPINB2 and CXCL6), epithelial to mesenchymal transition (CCL2 and IL6), embryonic/stem cell properties (CCL2, PDGFB, EVX1 and CFDP1) and pericytic recruitment (PDGFB). In addition, bioinformatics-based analysis of the differentially expressed genes has shown that the most significantly enriched functional groups included development, cell movement, cancer, and embryonic development. Finally, the investigation of pericyte/mesenchymal stem cells markers via immunostaining of human melanoma samples revealed expression of PDGFRB, NG2 and CD146 by angiotropic melanoma cells. Taken together, these preliminary data are supportive of the “pericytic mimicry” by angiotropic melanoma cells, and suggest that the interaction between melanoma cells and the abluminal vascular surface induce differential expression of genes linked to cancer migration and embryonic/stem cell properties.

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Acknowledgment

We would like to thank Dr. Jonathan Braun for fundamental discussions regarding this research. We would also like to thank Huijun Yang for the immunostaining, Meagan Kiyohara, Ann Chan and the UCLA Clinical Microarray Core for their precious technical help. We also thank Dr. Dan Welch for providing the GFP melanoma cell line and Dr Richard Scolyer for providing human specimens of melanoma.

This work was funded by a Translational Research Fund from the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UCLA, and by a grant from the “Société Française de Dermatologie” (French Society of Dermatology).

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Claire Lugassy, Madhuri Wadehra, Xinmin Li, David Akhavan, Scott W. Binder, Alistair J. Cochran & Raymond L. Barnhill

  2. Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Claire Lugassy, Madhuri Wadehra, Xinmin Li, Scott W. Binder, Alistair J. Cochran & Raymond L. Barnhill

  3. Orthopedic Hospital Research Center, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Mirko Corselli & Bruno Péault

  4. Center For Cardiovascular Science, The University of Edinburgh Queen’s Medical Research Institute, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK

    Bruno Péault

  5. Laboratory of Molecular Pathology, Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, University of California at San Diego (UCSD), La Jolla, CA, USA

    Paul S. Mischel

  6. National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Hynda K. Kleinman

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  1. Claire Lugassy
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Correspondence to Claire Lugassy.

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Lugassy, C., Wadehra, M., Li, X. et al. Pilot Study on “Pericytic Mimicry” and Potential Embryonic/Stem Cell Properties of Angiotropic Melanoma Cells Interacting with the Abluminal Vascular Surface. Cancer Microenvironment 6, 19–29 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12307-012-0128-5

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