Neuropilin 1 has been implicated in the
vascularization and progression of cancers. NRP1 expression has been shown to be elevated in a number of human patient tumor samples, including brain, prostate, breast, colon, and lung cancers and NRP1 levels are positively correlated with
metastasis. In
prostate cancer NRP1 has been demonstrated to be an
androgen-suppressed gene, upregulated during the adaptive response of prostate tumors to androgen-targeted therapies and a prognostic biomarker of clinical metastasis and lethal PCa. Elevated NRP1 expression is also correlated with the invasiveness of
non-small cell lung cancer both in vitro and in vivo. EG3287 has been shown to induce
apoptosis in tumor cells with elevated NRP1 expression. As of 2015 there were no clinical trials ongoing or completed for EG3287 as a human cancer therapy. Soluble NRP1 has the opposite effect of membrane bound NRP1 and has anti-VEGF activity. In vivo mouse studies have shown that injections of sNRP-1 inhibits progression of
acute myeloid leukemia in mice. == References ==