Curr Opin Cell Biol 2011. Sep 29 [Epub ahead of print] Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Authors’ contributions YH: guarantor of integrity of the entire study, study concepts, study design, definition of intellectual content, literature research, experimental studies, data acquisition, data analysis, statistical analysis, manuscript preparation, manuscript editing, manuscript review, JH: guarantor of integrity of the entire study, study concepts, study design, definition of intellectual content, literature research, manuscript editing,

manuscript review, JZ: experimental studies, data acquisition, JL: experimental studies, data acquisition, TW: data analysis, ZZ: statistical analysis, YC: manuscript preparation. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.”
“Background Normal thyrocytes are used for investigations of hormone synthesis, regulation of proliferation and Quizartinib clinical trial differentiation and as controls in drug GW786034 mw screening. Primary cells and cell lines of canine, porcine, bovine, ovine and rat origin are used selleck kinase inhibitor to address different questions. Rat cell lines, especially the FRTL5 line, are used for proliferation studies [1], whereas porcine and bovine cells are used most commonly for differentiation and gene expression studies. Similar to ovine thyrocytes, cells from these species show a poor response to TSH and, therefore, are not suited

for studies of proliferation [2]. Due to their limited availability, very few groups use canine thyrocytes for their studies. Despite conserved physiology, marked differences between these species

have already been reported [3, 4]. Stimulation with TSH and insulin triggers DNA synthesis in dog thyrocytes and rat cell lines by very different mechanisms. Interspecies differences in the regulation of protease Plasmin activities are of particular importance because several lysosomal and membrane-associated proteases promote tumor development and progression. The lysosomal enzymes cathepsin B and cathepsin L are over-expressed in thyroid cancer as in most other cancers [5, 6]. Similar to other cancers, the participation of metalloproteinases, especially metalloproteinases (MMP) MMP-2, also termed type IV collagenase, in thyroid cancer progression has also been confirmed [7–9]. Additionally, the urokinase-type plasminogen activator is involved in the progression of thyroid cancer by remodelling the extracellular matrix [5, 10]. Increases in transmembrane proteases such as aminopeptidase N (APN) and dipeptidylpeptidase IV (DPP IV) are more specific to thyroid carcinoma [11, 12]. DPP IV activity is increased in some cancer types (e.g. thyroid cancer, prostate cancer, [13, 14] and decreased or lost in others (e.g. melanoma, [15, 16]). DPP IV regulates contact inhibition, cell cycle, morphological differentiation, tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases, anchorage-dependent growth and E-cadherin of epithelial cancers [17].