Seyedeh Hakimeh Rezazadeh, Reza Shirkoohi, Abdolhamid Angaji, Seyed Yusef Seyedena, Amir Nader Emami Razavi,
Volume 76, Issue 2 (5-2018)
Abstract
Background: Ovarian cancer is a leading metastatic disease. The epithelial ovarian cancer is one of the most common malignant cancers that usually remains asymptomatic up to metastasis stages, and most patient when diagnosed are in the advanced stage of the disease. Studies have shown that in the majority of epithelial cancers mesenchymal factor expression such as Vimentin increases, and the epithelial factor expression such as E-cadherin decreases, as a result, it causes an epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). The aim of this study was to determine the expression level of these genes and association between EMT phenomenon and development of ovarian cancer based on clinical and morphological findings.
Methods: In the present case series study, 70 samples were chosen from the tumor Bank of Cancer Institute taken from patients at Imam Khomeini Hospital, Tehran, Iran. The amount of expression of two genes, E-cadherin and vimentin, was investigated by real-time PCR method from February 2016 to September 2017. The RNA extraction was done manually, and then cDNA synthesis was performed; In each sample the expression level of vimentin and E-cadherin was measured with real-time PCR method. The patient’s clinical information with other data were analyzed with nonparametric statistical methods in SPSS software, version 19 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA).
Results: There was a significant relationship between expression of vimentin gene and the stage (P=0.026) of the disease and metastasis (P=0.009), There was no significant relationship between vimentin gene expression and tumor grade (P=0.207), age (P=0.11), tumor size (P=0.71) and family history (P=0.6). There was a significant correlation between E-cadherin gene expression and metastasis (P=0.027), no significant correlation was found between E-cadherin gene expression with tumor grade (P=0.690), stage (P=0.753), age (P=0.09), tumor size (P=0.537) and family history (P=0.56).
Conclusion: According to the changes in expression of vimentin and E-cadherin genes in ovarian tumor cells, and association between these two genes with clinical and morphological findings and the role of these genes in the migration and invasion, we can use the both genes, vimentin and E-cadherin, as genes involved in the EMT process to assess disease progression and incidence of cell invasion in ovarian cancer.
Sima Ravaei, Fatemeh Rajabpour, Mina Tabrizi , Alireza Khoshnevisan,
Volume 79, Issue 7 (10-2021)
Abstract
Glioma is the most common type of brain tumor and according to the 2016 WHO classification, based on invasion level, it is divided into four categories. The most severe and invasive type is grade IV glioma or glioblastoma (GBM), which has a very poor prognosis and a survival rate of only 15 months. However, the molecular pathway of invasion in malignant glioma tumors has not yet been clearly elucidated. Like other cancers, brain tumors are thought to migrate and metastasize to other tissues via epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT). EMT is a process by which epithelial cells lose their cell polarity and cell-cell adhesion, and gain migratory and invasive properties to become mesenchymal stem cells. Studies have shown that EMT and angiogenesis can help brain tumors to migrate to other parts of the brain as well as surrounding tissues. Thus they can induce metastasis. EMT is controlled by three gene families, including SNAIL, TWIST, and ZEB. During EMT, the expression of epithelial-related genes is silenced, and, conversely, the expression of mesenchymal-related genes is increased. In this way, the cells acquire the mesenchymal tissue’s features and can be prepared for invasion and metastasis. On the other hand, only about 1% of the genome can take its role in the translation of functional proteins, and the large remaining part of the genome is made up of non-coding sequences. Therefore, much attention has recently been paid to the role of such noncoding transcripts, at the top of them, long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs), in regulating the expression of genes involved in important molecular pathways such as apoptosis, proliferation, invasion, and migration in cancer progression and metastasis. Any interference in regulating the expression of genes involved in each of these molecular pathways leads to cancer in different ways. Understanding and identifying lncRNAs involved in tumorigenesis and invasion of brain tumors, while helping to better identify the molecular mechanisms of metastasis in glioma, can also be effective as biomarkers in the diagnosis, prognosis, treatment, and drug resistance of glioma. Therefore, in this review study, the most important lncRNAs involved in EMT in glioma have been investigated.
