The effect of Annexin A5 overexpression on invasiveness and expression of the genes involved in epithelial-mesenchymal transition of HCT 116 cell line.

Epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) plays a critical role in colorectal cancer (CRC) metastasis. In the present study, we evaluated the effects of annexin A5 () overexpression on invasiveness as well as the expression of genes involved in EMT of HCT 116 cell line. PCMV6-AC-IRES-GFP plasmid harboring cDNA was constructed. HCT 116 cell line was transfected with recombinant plasmids using Lipofectamine 3000. Fluorescent microscopy was used to determine the efficiency of plasmid transfection. Cell viability was determined using the MTT assay. HCT 116 cell migration was evaluated using wound healing assay and transwell migration assay. Real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) was used to measure the expression of genes involved in EMT. The results of RT-qPCR showed overexpression of compared to the control group. overexpression had no significant effects on cell viability but significantly decreased the rate of wound closure in the wound healing assay as well as the number of migrated cells in transwell assay. Furthermore, overexpression decreased the expression of N-cadherin, Snail, Slug, MMP-2, and MMP-9 while the expression of E-cadherin increased following overexpression. However, VEGF expression did not significantly change after overexpression. Results of the present study suggest that overexpression might have inhibitory effects on the metastasis of CRC through modulating the expression of EMT- related genes.