Tumor metastasis, the important characteristic of malignant tumors, is closely associated with a series of changes in the expressions of genes and proteins. A novel gene MAG-2, which may have close correlation with lung cancer metastasis, was identified in our laboratory through an approach of suppressed subtractive hybridization using lung cancer cell strains with the same origin but different metastatic potential as models. The relations between MAG-2 gene and aspects of cancer metastasis including invasion, mobility, anchorage-independent growth capability and adherence to ECM, were investigated in our experiment models. MAG-2 gene was proved to be genuine and have mRNA and deduced proteins from itself by methods of expression profile analysis and fluorescence staining. Cytological experiments had demonstrated that hyper- or hypo-expressing of MAG-2 by gene transfection or RNAi leads to significant increase or decrease in the metastatic ability of cancer cells. In addition, CD44, MMP-2 and free calcium ion concentration intracellularly, were proved to be metastasis promoting factors, and found to be regulated by MAG-2 in lung cancer cells, this might be the mechanism of the metastasis promoting function of MAG-2 gene. The positive rate of MAG-2 mRNA was found to be significantly higher in tumor tissue from patients with metastatic lung cancer than tissues from patients with non-metastatic lung cancer. These data suggest that MAG-2 may be a novel causal gene for lung cancer invasion and metastasis.

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