Based on our advanced Cytokine Production Measurement Service and powerful technology, Creative Biolabs provides a complete range portfolio of assays for transforming growth factor (TGF) production services to meet our customers' different purposes. Our highly skilled scientists are ready to get started on your projects.

Introduction of TGF

TGF includes two distinct classes of growth factors, TGF-α and TGF-β. While TGF-α acts as a member of the epidermal growth factor (EGF) family, TGF-β, secreted by white blood cells, works hard as a multi-functional inflammatory cytokine and plays a key role in cancer progression. Together with bone morphogenetic proteins, TGF-β belongs to the TGF superfamily and mainly contains three isoforms (TGF-β1, 2, and 3), encoded by gene TGFB1, TGFB2, and TGFB3 respectively. They contain highly conserved regions that only diverge in several amino acid regions.

TGF-β is involved in various aspects of tumor development mainly through two transmembrane serine-threonine kinase receptors, TGFβR1 and TGFβR2. It has been sufficiently studied that the TGF-β signaling pathway inhibits cell proliferation in the early stages of tumorigenesis while promoting epithelial-mesenchymal transition, cancer cell invasion, and dissemination in advanced cancer. At the same time, accumulated evidence indicates that the TGF-β family plays a key role in drug resistance to chemotherapy and immunotherapy.

Fig.1 The signaling pathway of TGFβ. (Liu, et al., 2018)

TGF-β released and activated by malignant and non-cancer cells within the tumor microenvironment (TME) promotes cancer progression through highly regulated and differential effects on multiple types of cells, such as cancer-associated fibroblasts, endothelial cells, and pericytes. As shown in Fig.2, TGF-β attributes to tumor architecture, tumor migration, invasion, dissemination, and represses the protective functions of various immune cell populations, which limits the efficacy of immune-checkpoint inhibitors and profoundly influences immunotherapy responses. At the same time, TGF is an important tool to value the immune effect of Engineered Cancer Cells with the self-destruction strategy and some other cancer treatments.

Fig.2 Epithelial plasticity of carcinoma cells in response to TGFβ. (Derynck, et al., 2021)

TGF Production Measurement Services at Creative Biolabs

The production of TGF could be measured by methods including flow cytometry (FC), enzyme-linked immunoabsorbent assay (ELISA), immunohistochemistry (IHC), and real-time PCR.

The FC assay allows the measurement of TGF production by defined cell populations, which favors the study of definite functions and interactions of different cells. ELISA could be used to measure TGF that is secreted into the supernatant by stimulated cells to assess the possible roles of this cytokine in specific processes of disease or cancer. IHC assay help to visualize the detection and localization of TGF in the normal control tissue and benign or malignant cancer tissues. Besides the above services, Creative Biolabs also has the ability to establish a cell line stably expressing TGF-β-inducible luciferase, resulting in high detection sensitivity to TGF-β. At the same time, we could explore the localized surface plasmon resonance (SPR) method of antibody-conjugated plasmonic gold nanoparticles to measure the SPR spectral shifts of the single plasmonic nanoprobes, TGF-β will be detected with good sensitively and specificity.

With the in-depth study of TGF, Creative Biolabs offers advanced custom analytic service through the combined use of our software and multiplex analyzers, including FC, ELISA, IHC, real-time PCR, and SPR assay. If you are interested in this, please feel free to contact us directly.

References

1. Liu, S.; et al. TGF-β signaling: a complex role in tumorigenesis (review). Molecular Medicine Reports. 2018, 17: 699-704.
2. Derynck, R.; et al. TGF-β biology in cancer progression and immunotherapy. Nat Rev Clin Oncol. 2021,18(1): 9-34.

For Research Use Only | Not For Clinical Use