Gastric cancer: a mouse model and epigenetic statuses of blood in mice and humans

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Diffuse-type gastric cancer (DGC) exhibits rapid disease progression and a poor prognosis. We have reported an E-cadherin/p53 double conditional knockout (DCKO) mouse line as the first genetically engineered one, which recapitulates human DGC morphologically and molecularly. Recently, we have also established mouse DGC (MDGC) cell lines from primary tumors and lymph node metastases of the DCKO mice.We identified four circulating microRNAs that could accurately detect DGC at an early stage utilizing the DCKO mice, and indicated that one of them might have potential as a non-invasive biomarker in young human DGC patients. The results from in vivo and in vitro assays using the DCKO mice and the MDGC cell lines demonstrate that epigenetic alterations may play significant roles in diffuse-type gastric carcinogenesis, and support to develop a relevant therapeutic strategy in human DGC.