No abstract

High expression of immunoglobulin G (IgG) in many non-B cell malignancies and its non-conventional roles in promoting proliferation and survival of cancer cells have been demonstrated. However, the precise function of non-B IgG remains incompletely understood. Here we define the antigen specificity of RP215, a monoclonal antibody that specifically recognizes the IgG in cancer cells. Using RP215, our study shows that IgG is overexpressed in cancer cells of epithelial lineage, especially cells with cancer stem/progenitor cell-like features. The RP215-recognized IgG is primarily localized on the cell surface, particularly lamellipodia-like structures. Cells with high IgG display higher migration, increased invasiveness and metastasis, and enhanced self-renewal and tumorgenecity ability in vitro and in vivo. Importantly, depletion of IgG in breast cancer leads to reduced adhesion, invasion and self-renewal and increased apoptosis of cancer cells. We conclude that high expression of IgG is a novel biomarker of tumor progression, metastasis and cancer stem cell maintenance and demonstrate the potential therapeutic benefits of RP215-recognized IgG targeted strategy.

It is well known that B-1 B cells are the main cell type that is responsible for the production of natural immunoglobulin M (IgM) and can respond to infection by increasing IgM secretion. However, we unexpectedly found that some epithelial cells also can express rearranged IgM transcript that has natural IgM characteristics, such as germline-encoded and restricted rearrangement patterns. Here we studied IgM expression in human non-B cells and found that IgM was frequently expressed by many human epithelial cancer cells as well as non-cancer epithelial cells. Moreover, CD79A and CD79B, two molecules that are physically linked to membranous IgM on the surface of B cells to form the B cell antigen receptor complex, were also expressed on the cell surface of epithelial cancer cells and co-located with IgM. Like the natural IgM, the epithelial cancer cell-derived IgM recognized a series of microbial antigens, such as single-stranded DNA, double-stranded DNA, lipopolysaccharide, and the HEp-2 cell antigen. More important, stimulation of the toll-like receptor 9 (TLR9), which mimics bacterial infection, substantially increased the secretion of IgM in human epithelial cancer cells. These findings indicate that human epithelial cancer cells as well as non-cancer epithelial cells can spontaneously produce IgM with natural antibody activity.

RP215 staining is correlated strongly with differentiation, local invasion, metastasis and clinical outcome of patients with lung ADC. Our results suggest that RP215 can serve as a biomarker for prognosis of lung ADC.

The innate immune system of the skin is thought to depend largely on a multi-layered mechanical barrier supplemented by epidermis-derived antimicrobial peptides. To date, there are no reports of antimicrobial antibody secretion by the epidermis. In this study, we report the expression of functional immunoglobulin G (IgG) and immunoglobulin A (IgA), previously thought to be only produced by B cells, in normal human epidermal cells and the human keratinocyte line HaCaT. While B cells express a fully diverse Ig, epidermal cell-expressed IgG or IgA showed one or two conservative VHDJH rearrangements in each individual. These unique VDJ rearrangements in epidermal cells were found neither in the B cell-derived Ig VDJ databases published by others nor in our positive controls. IgG and IgA from epidermal cells of the same individual had different VDJ rearrangement patterns. IgG was found primarily in prickle cells, and IgA was mainly detected in basal cells. Both epidermal cell-derived IgG and IgA showed potential antibody activity by binding pathogens like Staphylococcus aureus, the most common pathogenic skin bacteria, but the microbial-binding profile was different. Our data indicates that normal human epidermal cells spontaneously express IgG and IgA, and we speculate that these Igs participate in skin innate immunity.