Treatment effects of rhBMP-2 on invasiveness of oral carcinoma cell lines.

OBJECTIVE: To determine if recombinant human bone morphogenetic protein-2 (rhBMP-2) has biological effects on the invasiveness of human oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCCA) cell lines. STUDY
DESIGN: Laboratory investigation using six human OSCCA cell lines, with three cell lines having baseline gene expression of BMP-2 and three cell lines without baseline gene expression of BMP-2.
METHODS: The invasiveness of each cell line was measured using a matrigel invasion assay with or without stimulation by rhBMP-2. A tumor metastasis quantitative PCR array was used to establish whether observed findings from the invasion assay correlated to changes in gene expression.
RESULTS: There was a significant increase in tumor cell invasion in response to rhBMP-2 in all BMP-2 positive cell lines but no change in the cell lines that did not express the BMP-2 gene. Quantitative PCR revealed that changes in gene expression were distinctly different based on the baseline gene expression of BMP-2 and favored a more metastatic genotype in the BMP-2-positive cells.
CONCLUSIONS: Recombinant human BMP-2 has an adverse biological effect on invasiveness of human OSCCA cell lines in vitro. This adverse effect is dependent on the baseline gene expression of BMP-2. Changes in expression of genes involved with tumor metastasis correlated to the invasion assay findings. These data raise concern for the safe application of rhBMP-2 for reconstruction of bone defects in oral cancer patients.