The milk-derived hexapeptide PGPIPN inhibits the invasion and migration of human ovarian cancer cells by regulating the expression of MTA1 and NM23H1 genes.

Some bioactive peptides derived from natural resources or synthesized by rational design have been proved to have very good anticancer effect. We studied the inhibition of PGPIPN, a hexapeptide derived from bovine β-casein, on the invasion and metastasis of human ovarian cancer cells in vitro and its molecular mechanism. The human ovarian cancer cells studied include the cell line SKOV3 as well as the primary ovarian cancer cells from ovarian tumor tissues of 37 patients at initial debulking surgery, diagnosed as serous ovarian adenocarcinoma. We showed that PGPIPN inhibited the invasion of ovarian cancer cells with Transwell chamber assay, the migration of ovarian cancer cells with cell scratch assay and colony formation of ovarian cancer cells. The expression (mRNAs and proteins) of genes relevant to invasion and metastasis, MTA1, and NM23H1 were analyzed by real-time PCR and western blotting. PGPIPN repressed the expression of MTA1, and promoted NM23H1. The effects of PGPIPN were dose-dependent. Thus, our study suggests that PGPIPN is a potential therapeutic agent for adjuvant therapy of human malignant ovarian tumors.