Figure 8From: Vascular endothelial growth factor C promotes breast cancer progression via a novel antioxidant mechanism that involves regulation of superoxide dismutase 3Expression of VEGFC and SOD3 in human cancers. (A) VEGFC and SOD3 expression values were retrieved from an Oncomine microarray data set [43] (as indicated in the figure) and were plotted by expression value. Statistical analysis was performed using Pearson r correlation (two-tailed). (B) Proposed model for the function of vascular endothelial growth factor C (VEGF-C) in breast cancer progression. Expression of VEGF-C in a subset of tumor cells confers the ability to resist oxidative stress generated during tumor growth, and this ability is partially mediated by Sod3. However, VEGF-C mediates other pathways that are important in conferring resistance to chemotherapies, thus contributing to tumor recurrence. Blocking VEGF-C signaling would therefore be expected to sensitize breast cancers to chemotherapies that induce oxidative stress, to contribute to a reduction in tumor-initiating cells (TICs) and to decrease lymphangiogenesis, thus likely improving survival and prevent recurrence.Back to article page