Cancer cells can poison normal cells

Now a team of researchers from the University of Delaware, Nemours/A.I. duPont Hospital for Children, St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix and Therapy Architects LLC in Wilmington, Delaware, has reported that cancer cells can actually cause neighboring normal cells to become cancerous. They found that cancer cells produce an enzyme, a protease, which splits a cell-cell adhesion molecule called E-cadherin from normal cells. The action of the protease liberates the segment of E-cadherin that projects outside the cells. This segment, designated soluble E-cadherin, or sE-cad, then associates with a signaling molecule called epidermal growth factor receptor on normal cells and converts them to cancerous cells.
"The serum of adult cancer patients contains high levels of sE-cad," says Pratima Patil, who received her doctorate in biological sciences from the University of Delaware earlier this year. "Our finding documents that tumor cells modify normal epithelial cells, disrupting their cellular architecture, and use them as accomplices to generate sE-cad, which is known to facilitate tumor progression."
This finding opens up new cancer research areas, including determining how cancer cells interact with neighboring normal cells and promote cancer development.