Papel dos nervos sensoriais na progressão do tumor de mama murino E0771

Abstract

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed and most lethal cancer among women worldwide. In Brazil it is the leading cause of cancer death in this population. Understanding the tumor microenvironment and the cellular interactions that occur in it is fundamental for the identification of new therapies to treat breast cancer. Among the components of this tumor, sensory innervation has not yet had its role established for the progression of the disease. In our study, we detected the presence of sensory neurons in the mammary tumor of a murine model inoculated with E0771 cells and we evaluated the impact of chemical depletion of this innervation in tumor development. We observed that the absence of sensory nerves was able to inhibit tumor growth, also altering vasculature, cell proliferation and the expression of intratumoral cadherins. Also, denervated tumors showed a decrease of spontaneous lung metastases in this model. Thus, our data suggest a negative interaction of sensory neurons with the tumor microenvironment favoring the disease progression. Therefore, finding new ways to block sensory innervation in breast cancer patients could be a promising alternative for antitumor therapy.