Cervical cancer is among the most prevalent forms of cancer worldwide. C-C chemokine receptor type 5 (CCR5) is hypothesized to be a key functional protein involved in tumorigenesis. However, the role of CCR5 in cervical cancer remains unclear. Reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction and western blot analysis were used to evaluate the mRNA and protein expression levels of CCR5 in human cervical carcinoma tissues. Furthermore, a small interfering RNA was employed to knockdown CCR5 in HeLa and C33A cells. MTT, colony formation and Transwell assays were performed to determine the effects of this knockdown on cell viability, proliferation and invasion. In addition, micro RNA (miR)-107 was identified as a potential candidate regulator of CCR5 using miR prediction algorithms, and the effects of miR-107 and its antisense miR on CCR5 mRNA expression were determined. The results of the present study indicated that CCR5 is overexpressed in human cervical cancer tissues compared with adjacent normal tissues, and its downregulation inhibits cervical cancer cell growth and proliferation. Furthermore, the downregulation of CCR5 appears to suppress cervical cancer cell invasion. Finally, the tumor suppressor miR-107 was able to directly target CCR5 and inhibit its expression. These results suggest that the upregulation of CCR5, which is inhibited by miR-107, may play a carcinogenic role in cervical cancer and could provide a novel therapeutic target in the future.

Our objective is to explore the clinical value of thinprep cytologic test (TCT) combined with HPV-DNA detection in screening cervical cancer. 420 cervical cancer patients admitted in our hospital between April, 2011-April, 2014 were selected. All patients received TCT and HPV-DNA detection, and cervical tissue biopsy was used to confirm the diagnosis. TCT screening results showed that there were 175 patients were >ASCUS and the positive rate was 41.7%, histopathological screening showed that there were 199 patients were ≥cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) I and the positive rate was 47.4%. HPV-DNA detection showed 180 patients were positive which was 42.9%, and the positive rate of HPV-DNA detection was increased as the disease severity increased. The sensitivity of TCT combined with HPV-DNA detection was higher than single TCT or HPV-DNA, however the specificity was relatively low, and the positive predictive value and negative predictive value were higher which were similar to pathological results. TCT combined with HPV-DNA detection has high sensitivity and accuracy in screening cervical cancer, which is worthy of clinical application.

The bone morphogenetic protein‐2 (BMP2) plays a crucial role in bone formation, growth and regeneration, which adopts a conformational wrist epitope and a linear knuckle epitope to interact with its type‐I (BRI) and type‐II (BRII) receptors, respectively. In this study, we systematically examine the BRII‐recognition site of BMP2 at structural, energetic and dynamic levels and accurately locate hotspots of the recognition at BMP2–BRII complex interface. It is revealed that the traditional knuckle epitope (BMP2 residue range 73–92) do fully match the identified hotspots; the BMP2‐recognition site includes the C‐terminal region of traditional knuckle epitope as well as its flanked β‐strands. In addition, the protein context of full‐length BMP2 is also responsible for the recognition by addressing conformational constraint on the native epitope segment. Therefore, we herein redefine the knuckle epitope to BMP2 residue range 84–102, which has a similar sequence length but is slid along the protein sequence by ~10 residues as compared to traditional knuckle epitope. The redefined one is also a linear epitope that is natively a double‐stranded β‐sheet with two asymmetric arms as compared to the natively single β‐strand of the traditional version, although their sequences are partially overlapped to each other. It is revealed that the redefined epitope‐derived peptide LN84–102 exhibits an improved affinity by >3‐fold relative to the traditional epitope‐derived peptide KL73–92. Even so, the LN84–102 peptide still cannot fully represent the BMP2 recognition event by BRII that has been reported to have a nanomolar affinity. We further introduce a disulfide bond across the two arms of double‐stranded β‐sheet to constrain the free LN84–102 peptide conformation, which mimics the conformational constraint addressed by protein context. Consequently, several cyclic peptides are redesigned, in which the LN84–102(cyc89‐101) is determined to exhibit a sub‐micromolar affinity; this value is ~5‐fold higher than its linear counterpart. Structural analysis also reveals that the cyclic peptide can interact with BRII in a similar binding mode with the redefined knuckle epitope region in full‐length BMP2 protein.

No abstract