Establishment and characterization of a carcinoma-associated fibroblast cell line derived from a human salivary gland adenoid cystic carcinoma

Abstract

Salivary gland adenoid cystic carcinoma (SACC) is one of the most common malignancies in the oral and maxillofacial region. Carcinoma-associated fibroblast (CAF) is an important component in the tumor microenvironment and participates in SACC progression. In this study, we established a CAF cell line derived from a human SACC and named it CAF-SA. It was identified that CAF-SA expressed typical CAF biomarkers. Then, we studied the cellular communications between CAF-SA, tumor cells and endothelial cells. It was found that CAF-SA promoted the migration, invasion, and proliferation of SACC tumor cells in vitro. In addition, tube formation by endothelial cells was enhanced by CAF-SA. In vivo experiment showed that SACC cells formed larger xenografts in nude mice when they were transplanted with CAF-SA. Overall, we demonstrated that CAF-SA exhibited the most important defining feature of CAF by promoting cancer progression.

Keywords:

• Carcinoma-associated fibroblast
• salivary gland adenoid cystic carcinoma
• cell line
• invasion
• angiogenesis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China [81571767].