Gastric carcinoma is one of the most frequent malignant tumors in the world. The gastric carcinoma cell with fibroblastic pattern which intracellular adhesion was decreased showed active mobility and invasiveness，which indicated that the EMT was placed. The TJ protein participated in EMT of tumors. Four transmembrane proteins of claudin family were essential component of TJ, but the effect of the TJ protein in the development of cancers was not clarified, especially the effect of claudin-1 expression transformation in gastric carcinomas.
A research article to be published on August 21, 2008 in the World Journal of Gastroenterology addresses this question. The research team led by Professor Zhang from Dept. of Pathology in the First Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University used immunohistochemistry to study the expression of claudin-1 and the relationship between the expression transformation of claudin-1 and the biological behavior in the gastric carcinomas.
The positive relationship between the over-expression of claudin-1 and the invasiveness and metastasis was found. The expression transformation of claudin-1 with the invasiveness and metastasis was found in the gastric carcinoma. Compared with the claudin-1 expression in the areas of mucosa, the expression of claudin-1 in the areas of the invasive front was transformed in 28/136 gastric carcinoma, in which the expression of claudin-1 was transformed from low to high. The transformed rate of claudin-1 expression significantly related with the degree of differentiation and the depth of the invasiveness in gastric carcinomas. However, the mechanism of claudin-1 expression transformation was unclear and need to further study.
The discovery in this study is mainly the positive relationship between expression transformation of claudin-1 and biological behavior in gastric carcinomas. These results demonstrate up-regulation and transformation of claudin expression in the invasiveness process of gastric carcinomas involves in biological behavior transformation of tumors and TJ protein participated in process of the EMT and MET, and thus may provide a new idea for further understanding of the biological function of TJ protein in cancers.
Reference: Wu YL, Zhang S, Wang GR, Chen YP. Expression transformation of claudin-1 in the process of gastric adenocarcinoma invasion.World J Gastroenterol 2008; 14(31): 4943-4948
http://www.wjgnet.com/1007-9327/14/4943.asp
Correspondence to: Dr. Sheng Zhang, Department of Pathology, the First Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou, 350005, Fujian Province, China. zhgshg@126.com
Telephone: +86-591-87982733 Fax: +86-591-87982028
About World Journal of Gastroenterology
World Journal of Gastroenterology (WJG), a leading international journal in gastroenterology and hepatology, has established a reputation for publishing first class research on esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, viral hepatitis, colorectal cancer, and H pylori infection and provides a forum for both clinicians and scientists. WJG has been indexed and abstracted in Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch) and Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition, Index Medicus, MEDLINE and PubMed, Chemical Abstracts, EMBASE/Excerpta Medica, Abstracts Journals, Nature Clinical Practice Gastroenterology and Hepatology, CAB Abstracts and Global Health. ISI JCR 2003-2000 IF: 3.318, 2.532, 1.445 and 0.993. WJG is a weekly journal published by WJG Press. The publication dates are the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th day of every month. WJG is supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 30224801 and No. 30424812, and was founded with the name of China National Journal of New Gastroenterology on October 1, 1995, and renamed WJG on January 25, 1998.
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World Journal of Gastroenterology