Expression of Fas-estrogen receptor fusion protein induces cell death in pancreatic cancer cell lines

Recently, a novel system to induce apoptosis was reported. Fusion protein between Fas and the ligand-binding domain of the estrogen receptor (MfasER) could cause apoptotic cell death in an estrogen-dependent manner on murine fibrosarcoma L929 cells and human cervical carcinoma HeLa cells [1]. To investigate the application of this system to the gene therapy of pancreatic cancer, we introduced MfasER cDNA to six cell lines. Transiently expressed MfasER could cause cell death in all the cell lines tested. Furthermore, stably MfasER-expressing cells showed DNA fragmentation as early as 2 h and completely died in 48 h in the presence of estrogen. Combined with effective methods to introduce genes to pancreatic cancer selectively, MfasER would be a good tool for the gene therapy of pancreatic cancer in the future.