DLC-1, a GTPase-activating protein for Rho, is associated with cell proliferation, morphology, and migration in human hepatocellular carcinoma.

DLC-1 (deleted in liver cancer-1) is a tumor suppressor gene for hepatocellular carcinoma and other cancers. To characterize its functions, we constructed recombinant adenovirus encoding the wild-type DLC-1 and examined its effects on behaviors of a hepatocellular carcinoma cell line (SNU-368), which does not express DLC-1. Here, we found that restoration of DLC-1 expression in the SNU-368 cells caused an inhibition of cell proliferation with an increase of a subG1 population. Furthermore, DLC-1 overexpression induced disassembly of stress fibers and extensive membrane protrusions around cells on laminin-1. DLC-1 overexpression also inhibited cell migration and dephosphorylated focal adhesion proteins such as focal adhesion kinase (FAK), Cas (p130Cas; Crk-associated substrate), and paxillin. These observations suggest that DLC-1 plays important roles in signal transduction pathway regulating cell proliferation, cell morphology, and cell migration by affecting Rho family GTPases and focal adhesion proteins.