Hypoxia promotes thyroid cancer progression through HIF1α/FGF11 feedback loop

Hypoxia is an important cause of cervical lymph nodes metastasis and recurrence of thyroid cancer, but its specific mechanism remains unclear. In the present study, we constructed a hypoxia model of thyroid cancer cells and explored the potential targets of hypoxia response through sequencing. The function and mechanism of the target protein were investigated in an in vitro cell model. We found that fibroblast growth factor 11 (FGF11), a member of the FGFs family, was upregulated in hypoxic thyroid cancer cells and thyroid cancer tissues. The knockdown of FGF11 blocked the promotion of hypoxia on the proliferation, migration and invasion of tumor cells. Importantly, FGF11 enhanced the stability of HIF1α through inhibiting its degradation in TPC-1 cells. under hypoxic condition, FGF11 formed a positive feedback loop with HIF1α to promote the growth and metastasis of thyroid cancer.