www.impactjournals.com/oncotarget/ Oncotarget, Vol. 6, No. 15 PTPRG suppresses tumor growth and invasion via inhibition of Akt signaling in nasopharyngeal carcinoma Arthur Kwok Leung Cheung1,2, Joseph Chok Yan Ip1, Adrian Chi Hang Chu1, Yue Cheng1,2, Merrin Man Long Leong1, Josephine Mun Yee Ko1, Wai Ho Shuen1,4, Hong Lok Lung1,2 and Maria Li Lung1,2,3 1 Department of Clinical Oncology, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong (SAR), People’s Republic of China 2 Centre for Cancer Research, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong (SAR), People’s Republic of China 3 Centre for Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Research, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong (SAR), People’s Republic of China 4 Division of Medical Oncology, National Cancer Centre, Singapore Correspondence to: Maria Li Lung, email:
[email protected] Keywords: PTPRG, Akt, EGFR, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, tumor suppressor Received: January 13, 2015 Accepted: April 03, 2015 Published: April 19, 2015 This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. ABSTRACT Protein Tyrosine Phosphatase, Receptor Type G (PTPRG) was identified as a candidate tumor suppressor gene in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). PTPRG induces significantin vivo tumor suppression in NPC. We identified EGFR as a PTPRG potential interacting partner and examined this interaction. Dephosphorylation of EGFR at EGFR-Y1068 and -Y1086 sites inactivated the PI3K/Akt signaling cascade and subsequent down-regulation of downstream pro-angiogenic and -invasive proteins (VEGF, IL6, and IL8) and suppressed tumor cell proliferation, angiogenesis, and invasion.