Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UNIPROT:O76050 (neu)
 3,969 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Overexpression of the HER2/neu oncogene in ovarian tumor cells is associated with relative resistance to lymphokine-activated killer (LAK) cell cytotoxicity. Treatment with gamma-interferon (IFN-gamma) (200-2000 units/ml) for 3 days markedly enhanced the sensitivity of HER2/neu-overexpressing ovarian tumor cells to LAK cells but had no effect on the sensitivity of nonexpressing ovarian targets. Increased sensitivity to lysis was associated with an increase in effector-target conjugate formation, the induction of target cell intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM-1) expression, and the down-regulation of HER2/neu expression. Anti-ICAM-1 antibody blocked the enhanced lysis, indicating that ICAM-1 is important in the increased sensitivity to LAK cells. However, induction of ICAM-1 expression did not correlate well with enhanced sensitivity to lysis; it was maximal after 24 h of exposure to IFN-gamma and still present 24 h after removing IFN-gamma. In contrast, enhanced lysis required 3 days of exposure to IFN-gamma and was reversed within 24 h after removal of IFN-gamma. These data indicate that, although ICAM-1 is necessary, it is not sufficient for the IFN-gamma-induced enhancement of sensitivity to LAK lysis.
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PMID:Interferon-induced increase in sensitivity of ovarian cancer targets to lysis by lymphokine-activated killer cells: selective effects on HER2/neu-overexpressing cells. 134 83

Since overexpression of HER2/neu oncogenes in breast cancer cells is associated with resistance to the cytotoxic effect of tumor necrosis factor (TNF), we investigated whether this correlation also existed for ovarian cancer targets. Nine continuously cultured human ovarian cancer lines were studied and compared to 3 breast cancer lines. Three of the ovarian and 1 breast cancer line demonstrated amplified HER2/neu genes by Southern analysis, increased HER2/neu RNA by Northern analysis, and marked immunoperoxidase staining for HER2/neu protein. The other 8 lines contained unamplified genes and undetectable RNA and protein. All 4 overexpressed lines were relatively resistant to the cytotoxic effects of TNF. Interestingly, they were also resistant to lymphokine-activated killer cells. In contrast, 7 of 8 nonexpressed lines showed sensitivity to TNF and all 8 were sensitive to lymphokine-activated killer cells. There was no difference in sensitivity to lysis by hydrogen peroxide or peptide defensins between over- and nonexpressed lines. These data indicate that expression of HER2/neu oncogenes may impart a proliferative advantage in tumor cells due to induction of resistance to several different cytotoxic mechanisms.
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PMID:Resistance of human ovarian cancer cells to tumor necrosis factor and lymphokine-activated killer cells: correlation with expression of HER2/neu oncogenes. 197 19

HER2/neu-overexpressing tumor cell lines are relatively resistant to lymphokine-activated killer (LAK) cell cytotoxicity when compared to HER2/neu-nonexpressing lines. HER2/neu+ targets were also resistant to binding by LAK large granular lymphocytes (LGL) as shown by visualization at the single-cell level, a target monolayer binding assay and in "cold" target inhibition experiments. HER2/neu+ LAK-resistant ovarian cell lines demonstrated an absence of ICAM-1 expression while expression of LFA-3, N-CAM, laminin and beta 1 integrins was comparable to that of HER2/neu- targets. In contrast, the HER2/neu+ breast cell line, SKBR-3, which was also resistant to lysis and binding by LAK LGL, demonstrated normal expression of ICAM-1. Anti-ICAM-1 antibodies blocked binding and lysis of HER2/neu- carcinoma targets by LAK cells, further supporting the notion that lack of ICAM-1 expression on HER2/neu+ cells contributes to their resistance. The modest binding and lysis of HER2/neu+ targets by LAK cells was significantly inhibited by anti-LFA-1 antibodies, suggesting the existence of another counter-receptor for LFA-1 on HER2/neu+ targets. The following also supported deficiencies in post-binding events when HER2/neu+ cells resisted the lytic activity of LAK cells: (a) when the relative resistance to effector cell binding was overcome by exogenous lectin. HER2/neu+ cell lines were still resistant to LAK cytolysis, and (b) HER2/neu+ targets were resistant to perforin-containing granule extracts obtained from the CTLL-R8 cytotoxic lymphocyte cell line. These results indicate that deficiency in effector binding as well as post-binding events contributes to the resistance of HER2/neu-overexpressing tumor targets to LAK-cell-mediated lysis.
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PMID:Resistance of HER2/neu-overexpressing tumor targets to lymphokine-activated-killer-cell-mediated lysis: evidence for deficiency of binding and post-binding events. 809 27

Treatment of HER2/neu-overexpressing target cells with interferon gamma (IFN gamma) (200-2000 U/ml for 3 days) markedly enhances their sensitivity to lymphokine-activated killer (LAK) cell lysis. Increased sensitivity is associated with an up-regulation of intercellular adhesion molecule ICAM-1 determinants and a down-regulation of HER2/neu expression. In the present study, we show that exposure to another cytokine, tumor necrosis factor alpha (200 U/ml for 3 days), also decreased HER2/neu expression but had no effect on LAK cell lysis and ICAM-1 expression. This suggests that down-regulation of oncogene expression is not sufficient by itself to induce an enhanced sensitivity to LAK cell lysis. IFN-induced enhanced lysis was associated with an increased binding between effectors and targets, and antibodies to ICAM-1 as well as its counter-receptor LFA-1, blocked the increased binding and lysis. Treatment with IFN gamma still significantly enhanced lysis even when concanavalin A was added to the assay to induce maximal binding, indicating that a post-binding effect also participated in enhanced cytotoxicity. These post-binding alterations, were also sensitive to blocking with anti-ICAM-1 and anti-LFA-1 antibodies. Treatment with IFN also sensitized targets to lysis by T cells in the presence of lectin but had no effect on the relative resistance of HER2+ cells to lysis mediated by perforin or TNF. Together these data demonstrate the importance of ICAM-1 determinants in binding and post-binding events in the IFN-induced increased lysis of HER2/neu+ targets.
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PMID:Interferon-gamma-induced increased sensitivity of HER2/neu-overexpressing tumor cells to lymphokine-activated killer cell lysis: importance of ICAM-1 in binding and post-binding events. 810 95

The novel observations that intramuscular injection of plasmid DNA preparations could result in myocyte gene expression and induce immune responses to encoded immunogens has generated intense interest in the form of gene therapy. This phenomena can occur with both DNA and RNA reagents, and can be used in immune protection (vaccine) or therapy strategies. Immunization with DNA plasmids has generated protective immunity to a wide variety of pathogens and tumor cells in murine animal models. Immune response has occurred in a broad range of animal species following intramuscular injection of plasmid DNA encoding various immunogens as well as following other routes of administration (intravenous, intradermal, etc). The mechanisms responsible for induction of the immune response are as yet unclear, but responses include antibody production, T-cell proliferation, lymphokine release, generation of cytolytic T cells, and delayed hypersensitivity reactions. Plasmid DNA production and purification methods are relatively easy to standardize, and dual expressing plasmids allow incorporation of immune enhancement molecules or second immunogens. Plasmid DNA encoding nontransforming tumor-associated antigens are in development with a National Institutes of Health-approved protocol for carcinoembryonic antigen in colorectal cancer patients. Transforming tumor-associated antigens (eg, HER2/neu) may be approached with RNA or replicative RNA constructs for immunization. The efficacy of this immune approach will soon be examined in clinical trials in patients with cancer and the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.
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PMID:Polynucleotide-mediated immunization therapy of cancer. 860 23

We examined several culture methods to induce proliferation of natural killer (NK) cells from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC). In the presence of IL-2, a remarkable proliferation of NK cells was observed when PBMC were co-cultured with MMC-treated K562, which is known as a highly sensitive in vitro target cell for the NK assay. Addition of OK-432 or TNF-alpha and IL-1 beta also induced marked NK proliferation in a dose dependent manner. These NK-enriched lymphokine activated killer (LAK) cells showed highly cytotoxic activities against various MHC class I positive or negative tumor cells. They also showed potent ADCC activities against Herceptin-coated SK-BR-3, a HER2/neu positive breast cancer cell line. These results indicated that NK-enriched LAK cells are potent effector cells, and suggested novel therapeutic strategies for nonspecific immunotherapy as well as target immunotherapy in combination with anticancer antibodies, such as Herceptin.
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PMID:[Preparation of NK-enriched LAK cells--their potential cytotoxic and ADCC activities]. 1461 17