Xiaodan Ha,* Jingzhou Wang,* Keru Chen, Yuchun Deng, Xueting Zhang, Jiale Feng, Xue Li, Jiaojiao Zhu, Yinghua Ma, Tongtong Qiu, Cuizhe Wang,* Jianxin Xie, Jun Zhang Shihezi University School of Medicine, Bei-Er-Lu, Shihezi, Xinjiang 832000, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Jun Zhang; Jianxin Xie Email zhangjunyc@163.com; mayue850911@163.comIntroduction: As one of the most common forms of cancer that threatens men’s health, prostate cancer (PCa) is under a trend of increasing morbidity and mortality in most countries. More and more studies have pointed out that obesity is closely linked to the occurrence and development of PCa, although there are still many undiscovered molecular mechanisms between the two.Methods: In the present study, we compare serum lipid levels in patients with PCa and normal individuals. PCa cells (PC3 and 22RV1) were cultured in vitro, the TC/TG/HDL/GLU assay kit was used to detect the glucose and lipid metabolism level of PCa cells, the flow cytometry technique was used to detect the proliferation ability of PCa cells, and the Transwell was used to detect the invasion and migration ability of PCa cells. Western blot/quantitative real-time PCR was used to detect peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ) and vimentin/vascular endothelial growth factor-A (VEGF-A) expression levels, and immunohistochemistry was used to observe tumor-associated gene expression levels in nude mice. All data were analysed using the Independent samples t-test or rank sum test.Results: We found higher levels of FFA in the serum of patients with PCa. In vitro experiments have demonstrated that high levels of FFA can promote the proliferation, migration and invasion of two PCa cells (PC3 and 22RV1) and affect the energy metabolism of PCa cells. The upregulated PPARγ plays a key role in this process, and vimentin may be involved in this signaling pathway.Conclusion: We infer that high levels of FFA may promote PCa development by upregulating PPARγ expression.Keywords: free fatty acids, peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ, prostate cancer, vimentin, vascular endothelial growth factor-A
