Hepatic B cell leukemia-3 attenuates chemically-induced hepatocarcinogenesis in mice

Background: The transcriptional NFkappaB-coactivator B cell leukemia-3 (Bcl-3) is a molecular regulator of cell death and proliferation and highly expressed in the liver. Bcl-3, when dysregulated, has been shown to be widely expressed in several cancer types including hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but its precise function in pathogenesis is still unknown. Methods: To investigate the role of hepatic Bcl-3 during initiation and progression of HCC, 7 – 10 day-old, male mice exhibiting an increased hepatocyte-specific expression of Bcl-3 (alfp-Cre:bcl-3, Bcl-3Hep) and wild type (wt) littermates received a single i…