ABSTRACT
Objective To study the clinical significance of the mRNA expression level of a novel gene which encodes a kind of transmembrane prostate protein induced by androgen-PMEPA1, as it may predict the progress of prostate cancer from hormone-dependent to hormone-independent. Methods We used Real-time PCR to detect the mRNA expression of PMEPA1 and GSTP1 in prostate cancer cell lines (LNCaP, PC-3), epithelia cells of benign prostatic hyperplasia and tissues from 33 patients with prostate cancers and 16 cases of prostatic hyperplasia. Results We found the mRNA expression of GSTP1 and PMEPA1 were both down-regulated in prostate cancer cell lines. The mRNA expression of GSTP1 was up-regulated in 6.1% of cases, down-regulated in 81.8%, and showed no difference in 12.1%. While PMEPA1 was highly expressed in 27.3% of cases, lowly expressed in 27.3%, and not differently expressed in 45.4%. Statistical analysis showed that the mRNA expression of GSTP1 was relevant to ages, but had no relationship with PSA, TNM stage, osseous metastasis or tumor differentiation, while the mRNA expression of PMEPA1 was relevant to osseous metastasis and tumor differentiation, but had no relationship with age, PSA or TNM stage. Conclusions PMEPA1 is possibly a useful biomarker, as it can identify patients with unfavourable prognosis, however, this hypothesis needs to be further studied with large samples.