Observational studyOncology reports2020
Connective tissue growth factor produced by cancer‑associated fibroblasts correlates with poor prognosis in epithelioid malignant pleural mesothelioma.
Observational study in Oncology reports, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 36 citations in OpenAlex.
- Review
- Pleural mesothelioma.Nature reviews. Disease primers · 2025Review
- Cancer-associated fibroblasts in cancer drug resistance and cancer progression: a review.Cell death discovery · 2025Review
- Meflin/Islr is a marker of fibroblasts that arise in fibrotic regions after spinal cord injury.Nagoya journal of medical science · 2025Article
- Activation of platelet-derived growth factor receptors regulate connective tissue growth factor protein levels via the AKT pathway in malignant mesothelioma cells.Journal of biochemistry · 2024Article
- Association between high expression of intratumoral fibroblast activation protein and survival in patients with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma.BMC gastroenterology · 2023Article
- Crosstalk with lung fibroblasts shapes the growth and therapeutic response of mesothelioma cells.Cell death & disease · 2023Article
- Define cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) in the tumor microenvironment: new opportunities in cancer immunotherapy and advances in clinical trials.Molecular cancer · 2023Review
- Epithelioid Mesothelioma Patients with Very Long Survival Display Defects in DNA Repair.Cancers · 2023Article
- CCN proteins: opportunities for clinical studies-a personal perspective.Journal of cell communication and signaling · 2023Review
- Mesothelioma-associated fibroblasts enhance proliferation and migration of pleural mesothelioma cells via c-Met/PI3K and WNT signaling but do not protect against cisplatin.Journal of experimental & clinical cancer research : CR · 2023Article
- Article
- BMP and activin membrane-bound inhibitor regulate connective tissue growth factor controlling mesothelioma cell proliferation.BMC cancer · 2022Article
- Possible disease-protective roles of fibroblasts in cancer and fibrosis and their therapeutic application.Nagoya journal of medical science · 2022Review
- Good and Bad Stroma in Pancreatic Cancer: Relevance of Functional States of Cancer-Associated Fibroblasts.Cancers · 2022Review
- Epithelioid Pleural Mesothelioma Is Characterized by Tertiary Lymphoid Structures in Long Survivors: Results from the MATCH Study.International journal of molecular sciences · 2022Article
- Matrix remodeling-associated protein 8 is a marker of a subset of cancer-associated fibroblasts in pancreatic cancer.Pathology international · 2022Article
- A panel of emerging EMT genes identified in malignant mesothelioma.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Review
- Drug-exposed cancer-associated fibroblasts facilitate gastric cancer cell progression following chemotherapy.Gastric cancer : official journal of the International Gastric Cancer Association and the Japanese Gastric Cancer Association · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
19 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Malignant mesothelioma is an aggressive neoplasm for which effective treatments are lacking. We often encounter mesothelioma cases with a profound desmoplastic reaction, suggesting the involvement of cancer‑associated fibroblasts (CAFs) in mesothelioma progression. While the roles of CAFs have been extensively studied in other tumors and have led to the view that the cancer stroma contains heterogeneous populations of CAFs, their roles in mesothelioma remain unknown. We previously showed that connective tissue growth factor (CTGF), a secreted protein, is produced by both mesothelioma cells and fibroblasts and promotes the invasion of mesothelioma cells in vitro. In this study, we examined the clinical relevance of CAFs in mesothelioma. Using surgical specimens of epithelioid malignant pleural mesothelioma, we evaluated the clinicopathological significance of the expression of α‑smooth muscle actin (αSMA), the most widely used marker of CAFs, the expression of CTGF, and the extent of fibrosis by immunohistochemistry and Elastica‑Masson staining. We also analyzed the expression of mesenchymal stromal cell‑ and fibroblast‑expressing Linx paralogue (Meflin; ISLR), a recently reported CAF marker that labels cancer‑restraining CAFs and differ from αSMA‑positive CAFs, by in situ hybridization. The extent of fibrosis and CTGF expression in mesothelioma cells did not correlate with patient prognosis. However, the expression of αSMA and CTGF, but not Meflin, in CAFs correlated with poor prognosis. The data suggest that CTGF+ CAFs are involved in mesothelioma progression and represent a potential molecular target for mesothelioma therapy.
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