Study on the action mechanism of erlotinib in inhibiting metastasis of non-small cell lung cancer through down-regulating the expression of CD44 in vitro

doi:10.3969/j.issn.1002-7386.2017.06.006

Abstract：Objective To investigate the action mechanism of erlotinib in inhibiting metastasis of non-small cell lung cancer (HCC827 cell line) through down-regulating the expression of CD44 in vitro.Methods MTT method was used to detect the inhibitory effects of erlotinib on cell proliferation of HCC827 cell line and to calculate IC50 after 48-hour drug intervention.The changes of invasion and migration ability of lung cancer cells in thee three groups,control group,EGF (50ng/ml) stimulation group and erlotinib (0.323 μmol/L) intervention group,were detected by Transwell migration assay and scratch test.Moreover the expression levels of CD44 in the three groups were detected by flow cytometry and Western Blot,respectively.Results MTT assay showed that the inhibition rate of erlotinib on cell proliferation was increased with the increase of drug concentration (P ＜ 0.05),with IC50 being 0.323 μmol/L.Transwell migration assay and scratch test showed that erlotinib could decrease invasion and migration ability of lung cancer cells after blocking EGFR signal pathway (P ＜0.05).The results by flow cytometry and Western Blot showed that after the cells were stimulated by EGF,the expression levels of CD44 were obviously increased in three groups,however,after EGFR signal pathway was blocked by erlotinib,the expression levels of CD44 were significantly decreased (P ＜ 0.05),which suggested that the inhibitory effects of erlotinib on tumor metastasis might be correlated to regulating the expression levels of Cd44.Conclution The erlotinib can block EGFR signal pathway to down-regulate indirectly the expression levels of CD44 that is closely correlated with tumor metastasis,and then which can play an important role in inhibiting tumor metastasis.