Activation of IGF/IGF-IR signaling pathway fails to induce epithelial-mesenchymal transition in pancreatic cancer cells

摘要

Background: Pancreatic cancer stromal cells produce various protein factors, which presumably provide cancer cells with drug resistance and may influence their ability to form metastasis via induction of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). The goal of our project was to study the effects of IGF-I on expression of protein markers of epithelial and mesenchymal differentiation, and on expression of transcriptional regulators of EMT in pancreatic cancer cell lines.