earticle

영어

Background: Conventional two-dimensional (2D) culture systems have traditionally served as the standard platform for anticancer drug development. However, because cancer cells grow and interact within complex three-dimensional (3D) microenvironments in vivo , 2D-based assays often fail to accurately recapitulate cellular behavior and predict therapeutic efficacy. To overcome these limitations, bioengineered hydrogels have been explored to construct 3D culture systems tailored to cancer cells. Methods: As a step toward constructing a PEG-based hydrogel platform for the 3D culture of epithelial ovarian cancer, matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) secreted by SKOV3 cells (a human ovarian cancer cell line) were analyzed at both the transcriptional and translational levels by qPCR and human MMP antibody array. Results: Among seven representative MMPs analyzed, the transcriptional expression levels of the MMP genes decreased in the following order: MMP1 > MMP2 > MMP13 > MMP10 > MMP3 > MMP8 > MMP9. However, at the protein level, only MMP1, MMP10, and MMP13 were detected, and MMP10 and MMP13 showed significantly higher secretion levels than MMP1. MMP2, MMP3, MMP8, and MMP9 were not detected at the translational levels. Conclusions: The identification of protease secreted specifically and abundantly from SKOV3 cells is important for designing MMP-cleavable crosslinkers, enabling the construction of PEG-based hydrogels responsive to cellular activity. These findings contribute to the development of a physiologically relevant 3D culture environment for ovarian cancer research and anticancer drug screening.