Effect of norepinephrine and focal adhesion kinase (FAK) knockdown in prostate cancer

Chronic stress is associated with hormonal alterations that are known to promote cancer progression. The stress hormone norepinephrine promotes migration and metastasis of prostate cancer cells. Focal adhesion kinase (FAK) is a non-receptor protein tyrosine kinase which is phosphorylated during chronic stress or norepinephrine treatment. Here, we investigated how norepinephrine modulates the gene expression in Myc-CaP prostate cancer cell line. We also focused on the effect of FAK knockdown in norepinephrine-induced changes of the gene expression profile. Myc-CaP cells stably transfected with shRNAs targeting FAK or negative control were treated with 10μM norepinephrine or vehicle for 24 hours. The effect on gene expression was assessed by RNA-Seq.