Hepatocyte growth factor modulates vascular endothelial-cadherin expression in human endothelial cells

Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF)/scatter factor (SF) is a cytokine exerting a wide range of biological functions on many cell types, including vascular endothelial cells. II[HGF/SF increases migration, motility, and dissociatio n of human umbilical vascular endothelial cells HUVECs), This study demonst rated that such action of HGF/SF on HUVECs was achieved by regulation of th e endothelial cell-specific cadherin, vascular endothelial (VE)-cadherin, H GF/SF induced a time-dependent reduction of VE-cadherin protein from HUVECs as shown by Western blotting and immunocytochemistry, accompanied by an in crease in the migration of HUVECs. The change of VE-cadherin appeared at th e mRNA level, as demonstrated by reverse transcription-PCR, with a decrease in the VE-cadherin signal, These results show, for the first time, that HG F/SF targets the endothelial cell-specific adhesion molecule VE-cadherin.