Chronic IL-1 Exposure Attenuates IL-1 Response and Alters Gene Expression Regulation While Maintaining Therapeutic Sensitivity in BCa Cell Lines

Chronic inflammation is a hallmark of the breast cancer tumor microenvironment and is also known to be associated with disease progression and therapeutic response. Interleukin-1 (IL-1) signaling has been widely studied in breast cancer biology; however, the long-term effect of sustained IL-1 exposure on hormone receptor-positive breast cancer cells remain poorly understood. In this study, we investigated how chronic IL-1 exposure influences inflammatory response, hormone dependency, and therapeutic sensitivity in ERα+/PR+ breast cancer models, MCF7 and T47D. Chronic IL-1 exposure attenuated response to subsequent acute IL-1 treatment, but the chronically exposed cells remained sensitive to serum deprivation, retained dependence on estrogen or progesterone receptor signaling, and responded robustly to endocrine and chemotherapeutic treatments. Extensive changes in basal gene expression and histone modification revealed that chronic IL-1 exposure alters transcriptional reprogramming and chromatin remodeling. Together, these findings demonstrate that chronic IL-1 signaling drives selective inflammatory response in hormone receptor-positive MCF7 and T47D breast cancer cells. This work underscores the continued therapeutic relevance of hormone receptor-targeted strategies in chronically inflamed tumors and provides insight into how sustained inflammatory stress shapes tumor behavior and gene regulation predicted to promote tumor progression.