Levels of circulating mast cell progenitors and tumour‑infiltrating mast cells in patients with colorectal cancer

Pingwei Zhao; Peiwen Zhou; Tongyu Tang; Rui Si; Yiding Ji; Xintong Hu; Ang Li; Yanfang Jiang

doi:10.3892/or.2022.8300

Levels of circulating mast cell progenitors and tumour‑infiltrating mast cells in patients with colorectal cancer

Oncol Rep. 2022 May;47(5):89. doi: 10.3892/or.2022.8300. Epub 2022 Mar 16.

Authors

Pingwei Zhao^#¹, Peiwen Zhou^#¹, Tongyu Tang¹, Rui Si¹, Yiding Ji¹, Xintong Hu¹, Ang Li¹, Yanfang Jiang¹

Affiliation

¹ Key Laboratory of Organ Regeneration and Transplantation of the Ministry of Education, Genetic Diagnosis Centre, The First Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, Jilin 130021, P.R. China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

The role of mast cells in colorectal cancer (CRC) has been an area of intense interest. Mast cell density is closely related to CRC development and prognosis. The identification of mast cell progenitors (MCps) in peripheral blood provides an opportunity to explore the frequency and distribution of mast cells in the circulation and tumour microenvironment of patients with CRC at different disease stages. The aim of the presents study was to investigate the changes of MCps and mast cells in CRC. Flow cytometry was used to measure the circulating frequency of MCps in 37 patients with CRC and 12 healthy control (HC) patients, and the frequency of mast cells in tissue from 15 patients with CRC and 7 patients with haemorrhoids. In the present study, lower levels of circulating MCps in patients with CRC were found, which was significantly related to CRC development. After surgery, the frequency of circulating MCps was significantly increased. However, the frequency of mast cells in tumour tissues was lower than that in adjacent normal tissues and compared with HC tissues and was not associated with CRC progression.

Keywords: colorectal cancer; mast cell; mast cell progenitors.

MeSH terms

Cell Count
Colorectal Neoplasms* / pathology
Humans
Mast Cells* / pathology
Prognosis
Stem Cells / pathology
Tumor Microenvironment

Grants and funding

The present study was supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 30972610, 81273240, 91742107 and 81570002), The National Key Research and Development Program (grant nos. 2017YFC0910000 and 2017YFD0501300) and The Jilin Province Science and Technology Agency (grant nos. JJKH20211164KJ, JJKH20211210KJ, 20200403084SF, JLSWSRCZX2020-009, 20200901025SF, 20190101022JH, 2019J026, 20170622009JC, 2017C021, 2017J039, SXGJXX2017-8, JJKH20180197KJ, DBXM154-2018 and 2018SCZWSZX-015).