Expression and clinical significance of Mel-18 mRNA in gastric carcinoma / 中国癌症杂志

ABSTRACT

Background and purpose: Mel-18 is one of the mammalian polycomb group members. A number of related researches have implied that Mel-18 may play a role in human tumorigenesis.In this study, we measured the expression of Mel-18 in gastric carcinoma cells in vivo to explore the expression and clinical significance of Mel-18 in gastric carcinoma. Methods: Real time RT-PCR was used to detect the expression of Mel-18 in cancer tissue and corresponding normal tissue in 52 cases of gastric carcinoma. The association between Mel-18 expression and the clinicopathological parameters of the tumors was analyzed. Results: The analysis revealed that there was significantly decreased expression of Mel-18 in 18 (34.62%)carcinoma tissues in comparison with para-cancer normal tissue. There was no correlation between Mel-18 expression and clinicopathological parameters, such as age, gender, tumor size and histological differentiation (P>0.05).The decrease of Mel-18 expression was significantly negatively correlated with lymph node metastasis and clinical stage (P<0.05). The expression levels of Mel-18 evaluated by the ratios of gene expression were 1.357,0.453,0.183 and 0.170 in stage Ⅰ, Ⅱ,Ⅲ and Ⅳ gastric carcinoma, respectively. They were 0.634 and 0.210 in patients without lymph node metastasis and in patients with lymph node metastasis, respectively. Expression of Mel-18,lymph node metastasis, and clinical stage were significant covariates, respectively (P<0.05). Conclusion: Our results showed that Mel-18 might play a crucial role in tumorigenesis and progression of gastric carcinoma. It is possible that Mel-18 could be used as one of the biomarkers for predicting the prognosis of gastric carcinoma.