The expression of the secreted factor Wnt-11 is elevated in several types of cancer, including colorectal cancer, where it promotes cancer cell migration and invasion.
Since tumor hypoxia has been proposed to increase tumor aggressiveness, these data suggest WNT11 as a possible target for cancer therapies, especially for tumors treated with antiangiogenic therapy.
Luga and colleagues have described the production of exosomes by stromal cells such as cancer-associated fibroblasts that are taken up by breast cancer cells and are then loaded with Wnt 11, which is associated with stimulation of the invasiveness and metastasis of the breast cancer cells.
Finally, we elaborate on the relevance of Wnt11 to human cancer, where it appears to be important both for proliferation and/or survival during normal differentiation and for migration/invasion.