Staphylococcus aureus induces COX-2-dependent proliferation and malignant transformation in oral keratinocytes.

Staphylococcus aureus induces COX-2-dependent proliferation and malignant transformation in oral keratinocytes. J Oral Microbiol. 2019;11(1):1643205 Authors: Wang Y, Liu S, Li B, Jiang Y, Zhou X, Chen J, Li M, Ren B, Peng X, Zhou X, Cheng L Abstract The COX-2/PGE2 axis can play roles in mediating the progression of tumor. COX-2 induction was observed in oral cancer. In our previous study, we found Staphylococcus aureus, a pathogen prevalent in oral cancer, can activate the COX-2/PGE2 pathway in human oral keratinocyte (HOK) cells. Here, we investigated the proliferation of HOK cells affected by COX-2 induction and the role of COX-2 induction in the malignant transformation of HOK cells. We found S. aureus was able to facilitate HOK cell proliferation through upregulating COX-2 expression. With the induction of COX-2, expression of oral cancer-associated genes cyclin D1 was upregulated and p16 was downregulated. Transcriptome analysis showed that the "NF-kappa B signaling pathway" and "TNF signaling pathway" had the highest enrichment of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) with COX-2 over-expression. Seven upregulated genes (jun, tlr4, cxcl1, lif, cxcl3, tnfrsf1β, and il1β) in these two pathways were critical for the increased proliferation of HOK cells and might be associated with COX-2. Malignant transformation of cells was evaluated by soft agar colony formation assay and S. aureus infection promoted HOK cell ...
Source: Journal of Oral Microbiology - Category: Microbiology Tags: J Oral Microbiol Source Type: research