The Effect of Recombinant HopH Protein of Helicobacter pylori on the VEGF Expression in Metastatic Breast Cancer Model

Breast cancer imposes a considerable amount of cancer-related mortality and morbidity among women worldwide. Many efforts are in progress to reduce the disease burden and amongst the bacterial-based products received considerable attention as potential anti-cancer drugs. In the present study, the effect of recombinant pro-inflammatory outer membrane protein (HopH) of Helicobacter pylori on the angiogenic factor and tumor development in metastatic breast cancer model was evaluated. The HopH gene was cloned into Pet28a vector, induced by IPTG and expressed and purified by Ni-NTA affinity chromatography. The expressed protein was confirmed by SDS-page. The breast cancer tumor induction was performed using Breast cancer cell line (4T1). The mice were divided into different groups and underwent treatment by recombinant HopH and Herceptin, subsequently. The treatment effectiveness on tumor size was followed, and the expression level of vascular endothelial growth factor was evaluation by real time PCR. The SDS-PAGE analysis confirmed the expression of HopH protein with an approximate 34KD weight. Based on our results, the expression level of VEGF was significantly reduced in HopH-treated mice group comparing to the control and Herceptin group. Our results have shown that the recombinant HopH protein can effectively reduce VEGF expression in breast cancer tumor which was associated with reduction of tumor size. The HopH protein can be considered as a potential anti-cancer agent for future cancer therapeutic studies.