Role of tissue factor pathway inhibitor-2 (TFPI-2) in amelanotic melanoma (C-32) invasion

Human tissue factor pathway inhibitor-2 (TFPI-2), also known as placental protein (PP5) and matrix-associated serine protease inhibitor (MSPI), is a 32-kDa extracellular matrix (ECM) protein consisting of three tandomly arranged Kunitz-type domains that inhibits plasmin, trypsin, chymotrypsin, cathepsin G and plasma kallikrein but not urokinase and tissue-type plasminogen activators or thrombin. Earlier studies in our laboratory revealed that the production of TFPI-2 is reduced or absent during the tumor progression of human gliomas. In the present study, we investigated the role of TFPI-2 in the invasiveness of the amelanotic melanoma cell line C-32. We stably transfected C-32 cells with a vector capable of expressing TFPI-2 in a sense orientation (0.7 kb). TFPI-2 protein production was then determined by western blotting and the mRNA level by northern blotting in parental and stably transfected (vector and sense) clones. The levels of TFPI-2 protein and mRNA were significantly higher in the sense clones, but neither was detected in parental and vector control clones. In addition, in vitro Matrigel invasion/migration assays revealed that the invasive behavior of sense clones was inhibited compared with the behavior of parental and vector clones. This is the first study to show that the upregulation of TFPI-2 plays a significant role in reducing the invasive behavior of human amelanotic melanomas.