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The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19
The novel coronavirus pneumonia COVID-19 is characterized by all age susceptibility, which imposes a dramatic threat to the human species all over the world. According to current available data, the cytokine storm appears to be the most life-threatening symptom of severe COVID-19 cases accompanied w...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8180910/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34109213 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmolb.2021.666054 |
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author | Li, Hao Li, Jianmin Xiao, Wei Zhang, Yujing Lv, Yuan Yu, Xing Zheng, Jiao |
author_facet | Li, Hao Li, Jianmin Xiao, Wei Zhang, Yujing Lv, Yuan Yu, Xing Zheng, Jiao |
author_sort | Li, Hao |
collection | PubMed |
description | The novel coronavirus pneumonia COVID-19 is characterized by all age susceptibility, which imposes a dramatic threat to the human species all over the world. According to current available data, the cytokine storm appears to be the most life-threatening symptom of severe COVID-19 cases accompanied with lung fibrosis. Galectin-3 (Gal-3), a member of soluble β-galactoside-binding lectin families, has been implicated as a key regulator in various inflammation conditions in addition to its well-documented roles in cancer. The pro-inflammatory activity of Gal-3 in the inflammatory response and lung fibrosis of COVID-19 has been proposed by emerging studies, which suggested that inhibition of Gal-3 may represent a novel treatment approach for COVID-19 patients. Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) is an aggressive malignancy with poor prognosis. ICC accounts for 10–25% of primary liver cancers with limited therapeutic options, which has higher incidence in Asian countries, particularly in China. Cancer patients, including ICC patients, are highly vulnerable to COVID-19 due to their impaired immune system. It is thus undoubtedly a challenge for our oncology department to establish effective treatment strategies under the influence of the COVID-19 crisis. According to our management procedures in the COVID-19 era, emergency treatment will be applied to ICC patients who are under life-threatening conditions, despite the COVID-19 infection. To the best of our knowledge, the modulatory function of Gal-3 in ICC is still barely explored to date. In order to evaluate the therapeutic potential of Gal-3 for ICC patients or those comprised with COVID-19, we herein report our preliminary investigation into roles of Gal-3 in ICC. Our results exhibited that the expression of Gal-3 was significantly up-regulated in ICC tissues, and a significant correlation was observed between its overexpression and malignant progression of ICC cells. We further discussed the activity and possible molecular mechanisms of Gal-3 in ICC, which may pave the ways for further exploring the possibility of Gal-3 as a potential therapeutic target for treating ICC patients or those with COVID-19-related conditions. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8180910 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-81809102021-06-08 The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 Li, Hao Li, Jianmin Xiao, Wei Zhang, Yujing Lv, Yuan Yu, Xing Zheng, Jiao Front Mol Biosci Molecular Biosciences The novel coronavirus pneumonia COVID-19 is characterized by all age susceptibility, which imposes a dramatic threat to the human species all over the world. According to current available data, the cytokine storm appears to be the most life-threatening symptom of severe COVID-19 cases accompanied with lung fibrosis. Galectin-3 (Gal-3), a member of soluble β-galactoside-binding lectin families, has been implicated as a key regulator in various inflammation conditions in addition to its well-documented roles in cancer. The pro-inflammatory activity of Gal-3 in the inflammatory response and lung fibrosis of COVID-19 has been proposed by emerging studies, which suggested that inhibition of Gal-3 may represent a novel treatment approach for COVID-19 patients. Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) is an aggressive malignancy with poor prognosis. ICC accounts for 10–25% of primary liver cancers with limited therapeutic options, which has higher incidence in Asian countries, particularly in China. Cancer patients, including ICC patients, are highly vulnerable to COVID-19 due to their impaired immune system. It is thus undoubtedly a challenge for our oncology department to establish effective treatment strategies under the influence of the COVID-19 crisis. According to our management procedures in the COVID-19 era, emergency treatment will be applied to ICC patients who are under life-threatening conditions, despite the COVID-19 infection. To the best of our knowledge, the modulatory function of Gal-3 in ICC is still barely explored to date. In order to evaluate the therapeutic potential of Gal-3 for ICC patients or those comprised with COVID-19, we herein report our preliminary investigation into roles of Gal-3 in ICC. Our results exhibited that the expression of Gal-3 was significantly up-regulated in ICC tissues, and a significant correlation was observed between its overexpression and malignant progression of ICC cells. We further discussed the activity and possible molecular mechanisms of Gal-3 in ICC, which may pave the ways for further exploring the possibility of Gal-3 as a potential therapeutic target for treating ICC patients or those with COVID-19-related conditions. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-05-24 /pmc/articles/PMC8180910/ /pubmed/34109213 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmolb.2021.666054 Text en Copyright © 2021 Li, Li, Xiao, Zhang, Lv, Yu and Zheng. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Molecular Biosciences Li, Hao Li, Jianmin Xiao, Wei Zhang, Yujing Lv, Yuan Yu, Xing Zheng, Jiao The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title | The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title_full | The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title_fullStr | The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title_full_unstemmed | The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title_short | The Therapeutic Potential of Galectin-3 in the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Patients and Those Compromised With COVID-19 |
title_sort | therapeutic potential of galectin-3 in the treatment of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma patients and those compromised with covid-19 |
topic | Molecular Biosciences |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8180910/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34109213 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmolb.2021.666054 |
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