Human pancreatic cancer cell lines express the CCKB receptor

BACKGROUND/AIMS: The gastrointestinal peptide gastrin might be a stimulator y effector of the growth of human pancreatic cancer cell lines. Several aut hors suggest that this effect is mediated by CCKB receptors. However, no st udies have examined human pancreatic cells for CCKB receptor expression. Th e study was designed to evaluate cell lines from human pancreatic cancer (n =6), or normal pancreatic ducts (n=2), pancreatic tumor and control tissues (n=9) for CCKB receptor expression. METHODOLOGY: RNA from cell lines and tissues was subject to DNAse digestion , reverse transcription and amplification using CCKB receptor cDNA sequence specific oligonucleotides via polymerase chain reaction (PCR). After confi rmation of CCKB receptor sequence, the products were examined using souther n blot analysis. The relative expression was determined by photodensitometr ical quantification and normalization to the housekeeping gene p-actin. RESULTS: Six pancreatic tumor cell lines expressed the CCKB receptor. Ampli fication of CCKB receptor cDNA from 2 cell lines derived from non-malignant human pancreatic duct cell lines resulted in products with a significantly lower copy number. Tissues like stomach and brain served as positive contr ols. CONCLUSIONS: These results provide evidence that most human pancreatic canc er cell lines of ductal origin express CCKB receptor mRNA. Malignant pancre atic tissue may overexpress these receptors in comparison with normal tissu e.