Role of thrombin in the proliferative response of T-47D mammary tumor cells. Mitogenic action and pleiotropic modifications induced together with epidermal growth factor and insulin.

The growth of the human metastatic cell line (T-47D) in a chemically defined medium (DM) is shown to be dependent on the presence of three traditional growth factors: epidermal growth factor, insulin, and transferrin. The addition of thrombin further stimulates its growth. The mitogenic action on a human mammary tumor cell line from epithelial origin is a novel action of thrombin. Cells in the DM show striking morphological changes which are dramatically enhanced by the addition of thrombin. These observations are part of a pleiotropic response to the growth factors: the protein content of the cells increases in the defined medium; the 2DG gels of the 35S- and 32P-labeled proteins show important changes in spots, several of which are probably of cytoskeletal origin. It is also shown that cells in a semisolid growth factor-supplemented medium have growth advantages over their counterparts grown with serum. All the phenotypic changes mentioned above reveal the important role of growth factors in the growth and behavior of this mammary cell line. The results obtained with thrombin indicate a new site of action of this enzyme which may be important in the metastatic spread of human mammary tumor cells.