Effects of abnormal expression of CD73 on malignant phenotype in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Background: Cluster of differentiation (CD) 73, encoded by the NT5E gene, plays important enzymatic and non-enzymatic roles in cells. There is growing evidence show that CD73 is a key regulator in the development of tumor. Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is one of the most common cancers in east and southeast Asia. It is urgent to know more about the mechanism of NPC development and find diagnose markers for the patients. Methods and Results: Western blot, IHC and qRT-PCR were used to investigate the expression level of CD73 in NPC and we found NPC tissues had higher expression of CD73 than normal tissues. We also detected the relationship between its expression level with the clinicopathology and prognosis of NPC patients. The results showed CD73 expression was related to the clinical stages, lymph node metastasis and survival state of NPC patients. More importantly, patients with higher expression of CD73 had poorer prognosis. Then, CD73 was knocked down in NPC cells (CNE2 and CNE1), and the effects of CD73 on cell proliferation and migration were investigated by CCK8, colony formation, Transwell and wound-healing assays. We found knocking down the expression of CD73 in NPC cells could inhibit cells malignant phenotype. Conclusion: CD73 plays important roles in NPC malignant behavior and might be used as a novel target for the diagnose and treatment of NPC.