Objective To investigate the expression of chemokine receptor CXCR7 and the relation between its expression and clinicopathologic characteristics in papillary thyroid carcinoma. Method The expressions of CXCR7 in 79 cases of papillary thyroid carcinoma and their paracancerous tissues，and 33 cases of benign thyroid lesion tissues were detected by immunohistochemistry. Results The positive expression rates of CXCR7 were 0（0/79），65.8%（52/79），and 30.3%（10/33） in the paracancerous tissues，papillary thyroid carcinoma tissues，and benign thyroid lesions tissues，respectively. The positive expression rate of CXCR7 in the papillary thyroid carcinoma tissues was significantly higher than that in the paracancerous tissues （P＜0.05） or benign thyroid lesion tissues（P＜0.05）. The expression of CXCR7 was correlated with lymph node metastasis （P＜0.05）. Conclusion CXCR7 might take part in tumorigenesis，progression，and lymph node metastasis of papillary thyroid carcinoma.
Objective To investigate the role of chemokine receptor CXCR7 in the development and progression of pancreatic carcinoma. Methods The short hairpin RNA (shRNA) targeting CXCR7 was designed and delivered into AsPC-1 pancreatic carcinoma cells to knock down CXCR7 expression. The cell proliferation, cell cycle, and apoptosis after CXCR7 knockdown was determined by MTT and flow cytometry, respectively. The invasive ability of pancreatic carcinoma cells was evaluated by using the Transwell system. Results Compared with the blank control group (BC group), transfection of AsPC-1 cells with CXCR7-shRNA resulted in a significantly decreased expression of CXCR7 at both mRNA and protein levels (P<0.05), and the ability of proliferation and invasion significantly decreased (P<0.05). Knockdown of CXCR7 also significantly increase apoptosis (P<0.05), induce cell cycle arrest at G0/G1 phase (P<0.05). Conclusions Taken together, the present study showes that the knockdown of CXCR7 expression may play an important role in pancreatic carcinoma development, invasion, and metastasis, CXCR7 may be a potential therapeutic target for the treatment of pancreatic carcinoma.