Evaluation of sHLA-G levels in serum of patients with prostate cancer identify as a potential of tumor marker / 대한해부학회지

Prostate cancer is the most common cancer type in men and is the second cause of death, due to cancer, in patients over 50, after lung cancer. Prostate specific antigen (PSA) is a widely used tumor marker for prostate cancer. Recently, PSA is discovered in non-prostatic cancer tissues in men and women raising doubts about its specificity for prostatic tissues. PSA exists in low serum level in healthy men and in higher levels in many prostate disorders, including prostatitis and prostate cancer. Thus, a supplementary tumor marker is needed to accurately diagnose the cancer and to observe the patient after treatment. Recently, soluble human leukocyte antigen-G (sHLA-G) has been introduced as a new tumor marker for different cancer types, including colorectal, breast, lung, and ovary. The present descriptive-experimental study was carried out including patients with malignant prostate tumor, patients with benign prostate tumor, and a group of health men as the control group, as judged by an oncologist as well as a pathologist. After sterile blood sampling, sHLA-G was measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay in each group. The data was then analyzed using one-way ANOVA. P≤0.05 was considered as statistically significant. The results showed that the mean of sHLA-G level was high in patients. Also, it was found that there was a significant difference in sHLA serum level between the three groups. The data revealed that sHLA-G can be a novel supplementary tumor marker in addition to PSA to diagnose prostate cancer.

Clinical significance of HLA-G in patients with gastric cancer / 中华微生物学和免疫学杂志

Objective To investigate the clinical significance of CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes in pe-ripheral blood and the soluble form of HLA-G ( sHLA-G ) in plasma among patients with gastric cancer ( GC) . Methods Blood samples were collected from 135 patients with gastric cancer ( GC group) , 150 pa-tients with chronic gastritis ( CG group) and 80 healthy controls ( HC group) . Flow cytometry analysis and ELISA were used to detect the percentages of CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes in peripheral blood samples, the concentrations of sHLA-G in plasma samples and the levels of alpha fetoprotein (AFP), cacino-embryonic antigen ( CEA) , CA19-9 and CA125 in serum samples. Mann-Whitney U test was performed to analyze the differences between different groups. The feasibility of using CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes, sHLA-G, AFP, CEA, CA19-9 and CA125 as potential biomarkers to differentiate patients with GC from those with CG or healthy subjects was assessed by using receiver operating characteristic ( ROC ) curve analysis. Results The median percentages of CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes in subjects from GC, CG and HC groups were 18. 6% (12. 1%-26. 7%), 7. 3% (4. 2%-11. 0%) and 4. 6% (3. 6%-6. 3%), respectively. The percentages of CD14+HLA-G+monocytes in the peripheral blood of patients with GC were significantly higher than those in patients with CG and healthy subjects (P<0. 001). The concentrations of sHLA-G in plasma samples collected from patients with GC [(100. 6±61. 3) U/ml) were significantly higher than those in pa-tients with CG [(59.5±19. 9) U/ml) and healthy subjects [(45. 8±23. 3) U/ml] (P<0. 001). ROC curve analysis showed that in terms of GC diagnosis, the area under ROC curve ( AUC) , cutoff value, sensi-tivity and specificity for CD14+HLA-G+monocytes and sHLA-G in plasma were 0. 893 and 0. 720, 12% and 85 U/mL, 75. 8% and 50. 5%, 86. 7% and 95. 9% (P<0. 001), respectively, which indicated that CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes and sHLA-G were better than AFP, CEA, CA19-9 and CA125 in differentiating GC from CG and HC. Moreover, the multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that the CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes, sHLA-G in plasma as well as CA19-9 and CA125 in serum were positively correlated with the risk of GC after excluding the differences caused by age and gender factors. Conclusion The levels of CD14+HLA-G+ monocytes in peripheral blood and sHLA-G in plasma increased dramatically in patients with gastric cancer, which suggested that CD14+HLA-G+monocytes and sHLA-G might be risk factors for GC and could be used as potential biomarkers for the diagnosis of GC.

A Review of Non-invasive and Invasive Embryo Characteristics to Indentify the Most Competent Embryo for Transfer.

Identifying “competent embryos” (those with the greatest potential to develop into normal concept) for transfer to the uterus has been a matter of the highest priority and the subject of both hot debate and ongoing research, since the very inception of human in vitro fertilization (IVF). A thorough literature search was performed to evaluate the correlation between pronuclear morphology, early embryo cleavage speed, cleavage stage embryos, embryo/blastocyst development, “omics”, sHLA-G expression, PGS, and implantation/pregnancy-generating potential in ART. Based on available literature, an array/combination of laboratory observations could assist the scientist with embryo selection. The pronuclear stage morphology, the early embryo division, cleavage embryo stage and quality of the day 3 embryos provides limited guidance. We conclude that use of (invasive) PGS in specific patient populations is appropriate; however, more data are needed to determine its true value for overall impact in ART. Non-invasive selection of blastocysts on day 5 with optimal sHLA-G expression provides a very high degree of confidence to yield a viable pregnancy and potentially reduce multiple gestations.