Keywords

CCT2, CD63, Immunofluorescence, Chaperonin, Late Endosomes

Abstract

Metastatic breast cancer has the lowest cancer survival rate among women. 31% of metastatic breast cancer survivors live beyond five years. In comparison, 99% of women with non-metastatic breast cancer lived past the five-year survival rate. Breast cancer can be identified and treated based on the presence of hormone receptors (HR). The problem is that not all forms of breast cancer contain these receptors, so for these types of breast cancer, an effective treatment is not always available. The Khaled Lab identified Chaperonin-Containing TCP-1 (CCT) as a target for the development of breast cancer treatments and diagnostics. CCT is a protein-folding complex formed by eight subunits (CCT1-8) that was shown to fold many of the proteins involved in promoting breast cancer. CCT2 is a subunit of CCT that the Khaled lab found to be essential for the function of the chaperonin complex. CCT2 is also of interest because studies from the Khaled lab identified a relationship with the formation of extracellular vesicles (EVs). EVs are needed for cell-to-cell communications, and their synthesis could be deregulated with alterations of CCT2 expression. This research aims to explore the relationship between CCT2 and EVs. In the process, it was found that CCT2, in addition to being cytosolic, also localizes inside the nucleus of breast cancer cells and may have an unknown activity in nuclear processes. Importantly, exogenous expression of CCT2 in breast cancer cells increased the levels of CD63, an important marker associated with the biogenesis of EVs. Collectively, these results suggest that CCT2 may be essential for making the EVs that promote breast cancer metastasis.

Thesis Completion Year

2025

Thesis Completion Semester

Summer

Thesis Chair

Khaled, Annette

College

College of Medicine

Department

Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences

Thesis Discipline

Biomedical Sciences

Language

English

Access Status

Campus Access

Length of Campus Access

5 years

Campus Location

Orlando (Main) Campus

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Restricted to the UCF community until 8-15-2030; it will then be open access.

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Rights Statement

In Copyright