Cadherin as a tumor suppressor

Cancer cells become far more dangerous when they gain the ability to metastasize and colonize other parts of the body. But to start moving, the rogue cells have to break away from their neighbors. Walter Birchmeier (now at the Max-Delbrück-Center of Molecular Medicine in Berlin, Germany) and colleagues discovered how, showing that some cancer cells down-regulate a surface receptor that locks adjacent cells together.

The protein, known as E-cadherin, had caught the eye of developmental biologists such as Francois Jacob and Gerald Edelman because it enables the early embryo to keep its shape, Birchmeier recalls. His group tested whether E-cadherin (previously known as uvomorulin) altered the stickiness of dog kidney epithelial cells. In culture, the cube-shaped cells normally pack closely together and resemble a cobblestone street. Adding an antibody that latches...