The Role of Plasma Gelsolin in Epithelial Ovarian Cancer Chemoresistance

• Main Author: Asare-Werehene, Meshach
• Other Authors: Tsang, Benjamin K.
• Format: Others
• Language: en
• Published: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa 2020
• Subjects: Ovarian Cancer; Chemoresistance; Plasma gelsolin; T cells; Macrophages; Early diagnosis; Extracellular vesicles; Immunotherapy; Cisplatin; Apoptosis
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10393/41114; http://dx.doi.org/10.20381/ruor-25338

Ovarian cancer (OVCA) is the most lethal gynecological cancer with a 5-year survival rate less than 50%. Despite new therapeutic strategies, such as targeted therapies and immune checkpoint blockers (ICBs), tumor recurrence and drug resistance remain key obstacles in achieving long term therapeutic success. Therefore, there is an urgent need to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms of immune dysregulation in chemoresistant ovarian cancer in order to harness the host’s immune system to improve cancer survival. Early diagnosis and residual disease are key determinants of favorable survival in OVCA; however, CA125 which is the conventional marker is not reliable and has modest diagnostic accuracy. There is therefore an urgent need to discover reliable biomarkers to optimize individualized treatment and diagnostic recommendations. Plasma gelsolin (pGSN; an actin binding protein) is the secreted isoform of the gelsolin (GSN) gene implicated in inflammatory disorders, colon cancer and prostate cancer. Increased expression of total GSN is associated with poor survival of patients with gynecological cancers. As to whether this is due to pGSN is yet to be investigated. Increased expression of pGSN is significantly associated with the down-regulation of immune cell markers; however, the exact mechanism has not been explored. If and how pGSN is involved in the cellular and molecular mechanisms of OVCA remains to be determined. In our current research, we have demonstrated that pGSN is involved in the regulation of immune cells, early diagnosis, tumor recurrence and chemoresistance in OVCA, using standard in vitro techniques and human clinical samples (North America, Asia and public datasets). We have shown that pGSN is highly expressed and secreted in chemoresistant OVCA cells than their chemosensitive counterparts. pGSN, secreted and transported via exosomes, upregulated HIF1α–mediated pGSN expression in chemoresistant OVCA cells in an autocrine manner as well as conferred cisplatin resistance in otherwise chemosensitive OVCA cells. pGSN also induced the OVCA expression of the antioxidant and tumor growth promoter, glutathione (GSH), by activating Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (NRF2), a response that attenuated cisplatin (CDDP)-induced apoptosis. In human tumor tissues, increased pGSN mRNA and protein expressions were significantly associated with advanced tumor stage, suboptimal residual disease, tumor recurrence, chemoresistance and poor survival regardless of patients’ ethnic background and histologic subtypes. Increased Infiltration of CD8+ T cells was significantly associated with favorable patient survival; however, increased pGSN hindered the survival impact of these infiltrated CD8+ T cells. Further investigation revealed that pGSN induced CD8+ T cell death via caspase-3 activation, an action that resulted in decreased IFNγ levels. Increased epithelial pGSN expression was significantly associated with reduced survival benefits of infiltrated M1 macrophages, through caspase-3-dependent apoptosis as well as reduced production of TNFα and iNOS. The clinical application of circulatory pGSN as a biomarker for early detection and patients’ survival was investigated. Pre-operative circulating pGSN presented as a favorable and independent biomarker for early disease detection and residual disease prediction compared with CA125. The test accuracy of pGSN was significantly enhanced when combined with CA125 in multianalyte index assay. The findings suggest that pGSN is a potential target for chemoresistant OVCA and presents as a diagnostic marker for early stage disease and surgical outcomes, interventions that could maximize the therapeutic success of immunotherapies.