Effects of granulocyte-colony stimulating factor and the expression of its receptor on various malignant cells.
BACKGROUND
Granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) is extensively used to improve neutrophil count during anti-cancer chemotherapy. We investigated the effects of G-CSF on several leukemic cell lines and screened for the expression of the G-CSF receptor (G-CSFR) in various malignant cells.


METHODS
We examined the effects of the most commonly used commercial forms of G-CSF (glycosylated lenograstim and nonglycosylated filgrastim) on various leukemic cell lines by flow cytometry. Moreover, we screened for the expression of G-CSFR mRNA in 38 solid tumor cell lines by using real-time PCR.


RESULTS
G-CSF stimulated proliferation (40-80% increase in proliferation in treated cells as compared to that in control cells) in 3 leukemic cell lines and induced differentiation of AML1/ETO+ leukemic cells. Among the 38 solid tumor cell lines, 5 cell lines (hepatoblastoma, 2 breast carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma of the larynx, and melanoma cell lines) showed G-CSFR mRNA expression.


CONCLUSIONS
The results of the present study show that therapeutic G-CSF might stimulate the proliferation and differentiation of malignant cells with G-CSFR expression, suggesting that prescreening for G-CSFR expression in primary tumor cells may be necessary before using G-CSF for treatment.
Department of Laboratory Medicine, Konkuk University School of Medicine, Seoul, Korea.
Hee Won
HW
Moon
Tae Young
TY
Kim
Bo Ra
BR
Oh
Sang Mee
SM
Hwang
Jiseok
J
Kwon
Ja-Lok
JL
Ku
Dong Soon
DS
Lee