Semaphorin 3C Appeared Anti-tumorgenic In HCC Progression

Background:Semaphorins, a neural guidance molecular family, not only play important regulatory roles in axon guidance, but also in diverse processes such as angiogenesis, tumor migration and invasion, immune responses. Here, we assessed role of semaphoring 3C(sema3C) in the progression of HCC.Aims:To explore the role of semaphoring 3C(sema3C) in the progression of HCC.Methods:Immunohistochemistry of human samples are used to reveal the expression of sema3C in tumor or non-tumor areas. In vitro we established sema3C overexpressed or silenced cell lines to examine the effects of sema3C on proliferation, apoptosis, cycle, migration and invasion. And in vivo we used an exnograft model in nude mice to examine the tumor growth between the sema3C overexpressed group and the NC.Results:Immunohistochemistry of human samples revealed that sema3C was strongly expressed in neoplastic cells. Stable transfection of target sequences of sema3C miRNA significantly reduced the apoptosis, promoted proliferation of HCC cell lines, enhancee migration, whereas sema3C overexpressed cells were on the contrary, except that no significant difference was found in migration. However, the cell invasion is not affected. When the tumor growth was examined in vivo using a exnograft model in nude mice, liver tumors were of similar size and weighed the same between the sema3C overexpressed group and the NC.Conclusions:Sema3C is positively expressed in HCC and may be anti-tumorgenic in HCC with its impacts on angiogenesis. Our observations suggest that sema3C may be further developed into a novel antitumorigenic drug.