Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α promotes endometrial stromal cells migration and invasion by upregulating autophagy in endometriosis

Hengwei Liu, Zhibing Zhang, Wenqian Xiong, Ling Zhang, Yao Xiong, Na Li, Haitang He, Yu Du, Yi Liu
Reproduction (Cambridge, England) · 2017 · vol. 153(6) , pp. 809–820 · doi:10.1530/rep-16-0643 · PMID:28348069 · W2599335862
article OA: bronze CC0 ⤵ 79 in-corpus citations
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Hypoxia-inducible factor-1α promotes endometrial stromal cell migration and invasion by upregulating autophagy in the context of endometriosis.

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Abstract

Endometriosis is a benign gynecological disease that shares some characteristics with malignancy like migration and invasion. It has been reported that both hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF-1α) and autophagy were upregulated in ectopic endometrium of patients with ovarian endometriosis. However, the crosstalk between HIF-1α and autophagy in the pathogenesis of endometriosis remains to be clarified. Accordingly, we investigated whether autophagy was regulated by HIF-1α, as well as whether the effect of HIF-1α on cell migration and invasion is mediated through autophagy upregulation. Here, we found that ectopic endometrium from patients with endometriosis highly expressed HIF-1α and autophagy-related protein LC3. In cultured human endometrial stromal cells (HESCs), autophagy was induced by hypoxia in a time-dependent manner and autophagy activation was dependent on HIF-1α. In addition, migration and invasion ability of HESCs were enhanced by hypoxia treatment, whereas knockdown of HIF-1α attenuated this effect. Furthermore, inhibiting autophagy with specific inhibitors and Beclin1 siRNA attenuated hypoxia triggered migration and invasion of HESCs. Taken together, these results suggest that HIF-1α promotes HESCs invasion and metastasis by upregulating autophagy. Thus, autophagy may be involved in the pathogenesis of endometriosis and inhibition of autophagy might be a novel therapeutic approach to the treatment of endometriosis.

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Condition tags

mesh:D004715endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Autophagy Cell Movement Endometriosis Endometrium Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1, alpha Subunit Microtubule-Associated Proteins Stromal Cells Adult Cell Adhesion Cell Hypoxia Cell Proliferation Cells, Cultured Endometriosis Endometriosis Endometrium Endometrium Female Humans Hypoxia-Inducible Factor 1, alpha Subunit Microtubule-Associated Proteins

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