Prof. CHEN Liang and his research team, from Shenzhen Institute of advanced technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences has identified a novel oncoprotein, TRIM (Tripartite Motif Family Protein) 25, which is an endoplasmic reticulum(ER) stress sensor and plays an important role in the development of breast cancer, could help scientists developing potential targets and new ideas for early diagnosis and clinical treatment of breast cancer in the future. 

Although the 5-year survival rate after surgery of early breast cancer is up to 80%, the overall survival rate is not optimistic due to the recurrence and lung metastasis. For China, the number of new patients and deaths is 12.2% and 9.6% respectively of worldwide according to the Lancet Oncology. At present, targeted therapy is considered to be a good way to solve this problem. Thus, searching and identifying the crucial genes linked to breast cancer is still the key point. 

So far, by regulating the endoplasmic reticulum stress is still a new mechanism for the growth and progression of breast cancer, endoplasmic reticulum is a fundamental compartment that governs protein homeostasis. Whereas, how tumor cells have evolved coordinated signaling networks to sustain endoplasmic reticulum protein homeostasis, and further promoting tumor survival and progression, is still largely unknown. Many studies, include Prof. CHEN Liang’s previous research, have revealed that TRIM family members are closely related to tumorigenesis. 

By evaluation of the whole TRIM family members during endoplasmic reticulum stress, the team identified TRIM25 was significantly induced during ER stress and it negatively regulated UPR (unfolded protein reaction) pathways, especially the downstream JNK(c-Jun N-terminal kinase) signaling pathway. Besides, the expression levels of TRIM25 were remarkably unregulated in breast cancer tissues, and elevated TRIM25 expression level in breast cancer correlates with poor patients’ survival. 

These findings suggest that TRIM25 is closely correlated with the occurrence and development of breast cancer, further investigations and experiments are still needed, this research may be a potential target for the clinical treatment and prognosis of breast cancer.  

Published in Journal of Integrated technology, 2020, the study is a great contribution to revealing novel key target and molecular mechanism for breast cancer.  

Effects of TRIM25 knockdown on endoplasmic reticulum stress induced cell apoptosis. (Image by Prof. CHEN Liang's group)