Investigation of expressions of pla2g7, ucp2 and nedd4l genes associated with fat droplet formation in prostate cancer

Prostate cancer (PCa) is the second most common type of cancer affecting the male population worldwide and it is characterized by partially dysregulated lipid metabolism. PCa cells stores lipids in the form of lipid droplets and uses it as a building block for membrane synthesis to facilitate proliferation and growth. It is also very likely that chemotherapeutic or endocrine agents used in PCa treatment accumulating in lipid droplets which leads to therapy resistance. There are some genes involved in lipid metabolism and lipid droplet formation. In our study, we examined the protein levels of PLA2G7, UCP2 and NEDD4L genes, proteins Phospholipase A2 Group 7 (PLA2G7) genes; encodes phospholipase A2 and hydrolyzes phospholipids to fatty acids. PLA2s contribute to the generation free fatty acids needed for lipid droplet synthesis. Moreover, mitochondrial uncoupling protein 2 (UCP2) gene may function as a metabolic switch that promotes fatty acid metabolism instead of glucose utilization. Finally, Neural precursor cell expressed developmentally down-regulated 4-like (NEDD4L), an E3 ubiquitin ligase, is reported to participate in multiple cellular procedures by regulating substrate ubiquitination and protein degradation. Many E3 ubacting as regulaters lipid metabolism mechanism. The main objective of our study is identifying the levels of PLA2G7, UCP2 and NEDD4L proteins in DU145 and PC3 prostate cancer cell lines, which will point out at the correlation with different metastasis potential of both cell lines. Indeed, it was demonstrated that there was no significant difference in protein the level of PLA2G7 between the two cell lines, while the protein level of UCP2 increased with increasing metastasis potential in prostate cancer. Finally, the protein level of NEDD4L, on the contrary, decreased with increasing metastasis potential. As a result, it can be thought that UCP2 may support the progression of prostate cancer and there is a relationship between NEDD4L and cell proliferation control. Keywords: Lipid droplet, NEDD4L, Prostate cancer, PLA2G7, UCP2