Inhibitory effect of hTERT promoter regulated tumor targeting TRALL combined with chemo-radiotherapy on cervical cancer in vivo

AIM: To study the inhibitory effect of hTERT promoter regulated TRALL combined with chemo-radiotherapy on the growth of transplantation tumor of HeLa cells in nude mice. METHODS: The TRAIL gene activated by the hTERT promoter was transfected into HeLa cells; The GFP protein expression of TRAIL was examined by immunohistochemical staining;The rats were divided into TRAIL gene transfection group,chemotherapy group,radiotherapy group,combined treatment group(genetransfection + chemo-radiotherapy), and control group,with 5 rats in each group.The TRAIL gene transfected cells and the blank HeLa cells were seeded in mice subcutaneously. The combinded effects of TRAIL with chemo-radiotherapy on the nodulation of the cervical cancer HeLa lines were detected. The changes of tumor weight,sizes, and the tumor growth inhibition rate were determined. RESULTS: GFP/TRAIL expression rate was significantly higher in hTERT_TRAIL transfected cells than in control cells(P0.01). Nodulation of HeLa cells was observed on day 5-7 in all group, with no difference in nodulation generation time(P0.05). The transplanted tumor weight was significantly different between transfected hTERT-TRAIL group and control group (P0.05). The transplanted tumors in hTERT-TRAIL grew slowly compared to control group.The tumor growth inhibition rate was 43.08% in hTERT-TRAIL group and 61.63% in the gene transfection plus radio-chemotherapy group at week 4 (P0.01). CONCLUSION: hTERT-TRAIL exerts obvious inhibitory effects on the growth of HeLa cells transplanted tumor in nude mice.The gene transfection plus radio-chemotherapy may enlighten the future preclinical study and clinical therapy for tumors.