Cancers, Vol. 12, Pages 541: Molecular Profiling of Keratinocyte Skin Tumors Links Staphylococcus aureus Overabundance and Increased Human β-Defensin-2 Expression to Growth Promotion of Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Cancers, Vol. 12, Pages 541: Molecular Profiling of Keratinocyte Skin Tumors Links Staphylococcus aureus Overabundance and Increased Human β-Defensin-2 Expression to Growth Promotion of Squamous Cell Carcinoma Cancers doi: 10.3390/cancers12030541 Authors: Madhusudhan Pausan Halwachs Durdević Windisch Kehrmann Patra Wolf Boukamp Moissl-Eichinger Cerroni Becker Gorkiewicz The skin microbiota plays a prominent role in health and disease; however, its contribution to skin tumorigenesis is not well understood. We comparatively assessed the microbial community compositions from excision specimens of the main human non-melanoma skin cancers, actinic keratosis (AK), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and basal cell carcinoma (BCC). Keratinocyte skin tumors are characterized by significantly different microbial community compositions, wherein AK and SCC are more similar to each other than to BCC. Notably, in SCC, which represents the advanced tumor entity and frequently develops from AK, overabundance of Staphylococcus aureus, a known skin pathogen, was noted. Moreover, S. aureus overabundance was significantly associated with increased human β-defensin-2 (hBD-2) expression in SCC. By challenging human SCC cell lines with S. aureus, a specific induction of hBD-2 expression and increased tumor cell growth was seen. Increased proliferation was also induced by directly challenging SCC cells with hBD-2. Together, our data indicate tha...
Source: Cancers - Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Tags: Article Source Type: research