title: Correlation between Retinoic Acid Sensitivity and IGFBP-3, AFP Protein Expression in Hepatoma Cell Lines.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Retinoic acid (RA) has been known to inhibit the proliferation, and to induce apoptosis, of various cancer cell lines. We investigated the correlation between the protein levels of the RAR and RXR receptor families, IGFBP-3 and AFP, and the RA sensitivity in hepatoma cell lines.
  
  
  METHODS
  The cell growth inhibition was examined by assaying various 1 to 10muM RA treated hepatoma cell lines. Western blot analysis for the RAR and RXR families, AFP and IGFBP-3 were performed after treatment with 10muM RA.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The 1 to 10muM RA treatment induced growth inhibition in the SNU368, SNU354, SNU398 and HepG2 cells. The cell growth of SNU449 and Hep3B were not suppressed by 1muM, but were slightly suppressed by 10muM RA. An increased expression of IGFBP-3 in HepG2, SNU354, SNU398 and SNU368 cells, and a decreased expression of alpha-fetoprotein (AFP), was observed from the western blot analysis in all hepatoma cells tested, whereas no confirmed tendency of RAR expressions was seen.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our result showed that the growth inhibition of RA differed according to the sensitivity of the type of cells to RA. We supposed that RA-induced cell growth inhibition may be related to the expressions of IGFBP-3 and AFP, but no exact correlation exists between the growth inhibition and receptor expression status in hepatoma cell lines.
authors.forename: Hae Yun
authors.initials: HY
authors.lastname: Jung
authors.forename: Yong Myung
authors.initials: YM
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Young Do
authors.initials: YD
authors.lastname: Yoo
authors.forename: Jun Suk
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: Sun Hee
authors.initials: SH
authors.lastname: Park
authors.forename: Yeul Hong
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Kim
keywords: Hepatoma; Insulin-like growth factor binding protein-3; RARs; RXRs; Retinoic acid; alpha-fetoprotein