Analysis of TRIP expression in different types of skin tumor

TRAF-interacting protein (TRIP) is a ubiquitously expressed nucleolar E3 ubiquitin ligase. Ubiquitination of proteins is a post-translational modification, which decides on the cellular fate of the protein. TRIP in vivo substrate has not been yet identified. However, TRIP has been shown to play an important role in cellular proliferation, especially in keratinocytes. TRIP was found to be up-regulated in basal cell carcinoma (BCC) at the mRNA level. This prompted us to elucidate its role in skin proliferative diseases such as cancer by analyzing its expression in BCCs at protein level and in squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) at mRNA and protein level. To that purpose, we performed a real-time PCR (qPCR) analysis followed by an immunohistochemistry (IHC) on formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) biopsies. The real-time PCR was performed on 12 RNA samples of which 6 were extracted from SCC biopsies and 6 from normal human skin. The results were statistically insignificant. Further analyses are needed on new RNA samples. The IHC assay was performed on 20 biopsies from BCCs, 21 biopsies from SCCs and on 5 tissues from normal human skin. The results obtained showed an extensive expression of TRIP in keratinocytes nuclei. Due to various limitations related to the technique and to doubts about preservation of the antigens in the tissues from normal human skin, we could not highlight a clear difference in TRIP expression between the different tissues. In conclusion, further analyses are needed on new RNA samples (qPCR) and on better preserved FFPE tissues from normal skin (IHC) to assess TRIP relative expression in BCCs and SCCs versus normal human skin.

Histomorphological and immunohistochemical characterization of 172 cutaneous round cell tumours in dogs

This paper describes the use of a panel of antibodies (CD117, CD3, CD79a, CD45, cytokeratin, vimentin and E-cadherin) on formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded sections of canine cutaneous round cell tumours. Neoplastic tumours were diagnosed by histology and histochemical stains and included 107 mast cell tumours, 31 cutaneous histiocytomas, two localized histiocytic sarcomas, 21 cutaneous lymphomas, three plasma cell tumours, one transmissible venereal tumour and seven unclassified round cell tumours. The histologic diagnosis was modified in 39.5% of the total 172 neoplasms. The staining for CD45 and Ecadherin were variable, and therefore, the final diagnoses of cutaneous histiocytoma and localized histiocytic sarcoma were made based on histology in association with negative results for CD3, CD79a, CD117 and cytokeratin. The cellular origin of unclassified round cell tumours was defined in all cases. Cutaneous B-cell lymphoma and plasma cell tumours were CD79a-positive and could be distinguished from each other by the morphological characteristics. Mast cell tumours and T cell lymphoma were CD117 and CD3 positive, respectively. The positive staining for vimentin and the negative staining for CD3, CD79a, CD117 and cytokeratin favoured the diagnosis of transmissible venereal tumours. Thus, the final diagnosis of cutaneous round cell tumours should be based on the interpretation of immunohistochemical results together with the cellular morphology observed by histology. Therefore, more studies to optimize the specific markers in formalin-fixed, paraffinembedded tissues (especially for histiocytes) are required for definitive diagnosis of round cell tumours in dogs.

Surto de polioencefalomalacia por ingestão excessiva de enxofre na dieta em bezerros no Rio Grande do Sul

Neste trabalho descreve-se surto de polioencefalomalacia em bovinos decorrente da ingestão de dieta com excessiva concentração de enxofre em uma propriedade no Rio Grande do Sul. O lote era composto por 30 bezerros, mantidos em um piquete com azevém (Lolium multiflorum) e suplementados com ração e sal mineral. Seis bezerros morreram e dois deles foram necropsiados; amostras de tecido hepático para dosagem de chumbo e fragmentos do sistema nervoso central para histopatológico foram colhidos. Um dos bezerros foi examinado antes da morte e sinais neurológicos encefálicos foram constatados. Foi estabelecido o teor de enxofre nos componentes da dieta e água, a produção de sulfeto de hidrogênio ruminal em cinco bovinos do mesmo lote e realizada PCR de um bloco de parafina para detecção de DNA do herpevirus bovino tipo 5. O consumo total de enxofre foi de 0,38% da matéria seca fornecida aos animais e as dosagens de sulfeto de hidrogênio ruminal em animais do mesmo lote variaram de 1.000 a 2.500ppm. Os achados histopatológicos indicaram necrose laminar do córtex cerebral. Não foi detectado chumbo na amostra de tecido hepático e não foi identificado DNA do herpesvirus bovino tipo 5 no encéfalo. O quadro clínico de síndrome cerebrocortical associado aos elevados valores do sulfeto de hidrogênio ruminal, alta ingestão de enxofre na dieta e os achados histopatológicos permitem estabelecer o excesso de enxofre como causador da polioencefalomalacia.

Imunoexpressão do c-erbB-2 nas lesões epiteliais proliferativas intraductais da mama de mulheres

OBJETIVOS: Alterações genéticas são relacionadas à gênese e progressão do câncer. Neoplasias de vários órgãos expressam o oncogene c-erbB-2. Nas proliferações intraductais da mama tem sido avaliado como fator de risco para o desenvolvimento de câncer. Foram avaliadas a imunoexpressão do c-erbB-2 em lesões epiteliais proliferativas intraductais e as possíveis correlações com características anatomopatológicas do carcinoma ductal in situ (CDIS). MÉTODOS: Foi utilizado material de arquivo, amostras teciduais fixadas em formalina e incluídas em blocos de parafina de 88 mulheres. Destas, 51 com CDIS e 37 com hiperplasia ductal sem atipias (HDT). A idade variou de 35 a 76 anos. Revisados todos os casos, verificou-se: o grau nuclear, a presença de necrose, o subtipo histológico predominante e sua extensão. Obteve-se material suficiente para o estudo imunohistoquímico do c-erbB-2 de 84 sujeitos do estudo. RESULTADOS: Não foi observada a expressão do oncogene nas hiperplasias sem atipias e nos tecidos adjacentes a todas amostras teciduais. A expressão do c-erbB-2 foi verificada em nove (19,1%) dos CDIS (p= 0,0001). A imunoexpressão não se relacionou à extensão das lesões. A imunoexpressão do c-erbB-2 no CDIS correlacionou-se com subtipo histológico (p=0,019), com a presença de necrose (p=0,0066), com o grau nuclear (p=0,0084) e com a Classificação de Van Nuys (p=0,039). CONCLUSÕES: A expressão do c-erbB-2 foi estatisticamente significante nas lesões proliferativas de risco (CDIS) e correlacionou-se com características histopatológicas: alto grau nuclear, presença de necrose, subtipo comedo. Não houve expressão nas hiperplasias sem atipias e tecidos adjacentes.

Immunohematopathology markers in paraffin sections

New monoclonal antibodies have made the use of formalin fixed, paraffin embedded sections practical for immunotyping and immunodiagnosing many hematolymphoid neoplasms. In addition, they can be helpful in classifying malignant lymphomas and leukemias through patterns of immunoreactivity. The most useful. lymphoid antibodies and diagnostic situations in which they can be deployed are discussed.

Immunohistochemistry assay to detect Turkey coronavirus (TCoV) from experimentally infected poults

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Alterações genômicas na endometriose

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Epithelial-mesenchymal transition occurs in preneoplastic and neoplastic lesions of canine prostate

Background: The epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is an essential process in the tumor progression and metastasis. In human prostate carcinoma (PCa), the upregulation of cytokeratin and E-cadherin and down-regulation of vimentin have been associated with aggressive phenotype and poor prognosis. Due to the importance of canine cancer model it was evaluated the immunoexpression of AE1/AE3, E-cadherin and vimentin in canine prostatic lesions. Patients and Methods: A total of 75 prostatic tissues formalin-fixed paraffin embedded from dogs was selected: 10 normal prostatic tissues, 20 benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), 25 proliferative inflammatory atrophy (PIA) and 20 PCa. AE1/AE3 was detected with a monoclonal antibody (Invitrogen, 180132) at a 1:300 dilution, applied for 45 min at room temperature (RT). The antibody against Vimentin (V9, Invitrogen) and E-cadherin (NCH-38, Dako cytomatiomn) were monoclonal mouse antibodies, used at a 1:300 and 1:200, respectively, for 45 min at RT. The immunolabelling was performed by a polymer method (Histofine, Nichirei Biosciences,). A negative control was performed for all antibodies by omitting the primary antibody and substituting with Tris-buffered saline. The percentage of C-MYC, E-cadherin, and p63- positive cells per lesion was evaluated according to Prowatke et al. (2007). The samples were scored separately according to staining intensity and graded semi-quantitatively as negative, weakly positive, moderately positive, and strongly positive. The score was done in one 400 magnification field, considering only the lesion, since this was done in a TMA core of 1 mm. For statistical analyses, the immunostaining classifications were reduced to two categories: negative and positive. The negative category included negative and weakly positive staining. Chi-square or Fisher exact test was used to determine the association between the categorical variables. Results: All prostatic normal and BPH tissue were positive for cytokeratin, E-cadherin and negative for vimentin. Similarly, all PIA samples were positive for AE1/AE3. From those samples, 48% (12/25) were also positive for vimentin. 55% of PCa (11/25) was positive for vimentin and among these samples 75% (6/11) was also positive for AE1/AE3 and 45% (5/11) was negative for AE1/AE3. PIA and PCa presented a higher number of vimentin positive cells when compared with normal tissue (p=0.032). E-cadherin expression had no statistical difference among diagnosis groups, but we found a higher number of positive cases, with more than 51% of positive immunostaining in BPH and PIA (81.25% and 78.60% of the cases, respectively) than in PCa (55.55%). Conclusion: The carcinogenesis process regarding prostatic epithelial cells in dogs showed higher vimentin protein expression associated with concomitant loss of the cytokeratin and E-cadherin, similar in humans.

MicroRNoma do carcinoma de pâncreas

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Molecular risk assessment of BIG 1-98 participants by expression profiling using RNA from archival tissue

The purpose of the work reported here is to test reliable molecular profiles using routinely processed formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissues from participants of the clinical trial BIG 1-98 with a median follow-up of 60 months.

PRO_10--a new tissue-based prognostic multigene marker in patients with early estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer

Clinicopathological and molecular factors determine the prognosis of breast cancer. PRO_10 is a prognostic score based on quantitative RT-PCR of 10 proliferation-associated genes obtained from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded breast cancer tissues. We revalidated PRO_10 in patients treated in a non-trial setting.

Morphoproteomic evidence of constitutively activated and overexpressed mTOR pathway in cervical squamous carcinoma and high grade squamous intraepithelial lesions.

Human papilloma virus (HPV) infection of the uterine cervix is linked to the pathogenesis of cervical cancer. Preclinical in vitro and in vivo studies using HPV-containing human cervical carcinoma cell lines have shown that the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) inhibitor, rapamycin, and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-tyrosine kinase inhibitor, erlotinib, can induce growth delay of xenografts. Activation of Akt and mTOR are also observed in cervical squamous cell carcinoma and, the expression of phosphorylated mTOR was reported to serve as a marker to predict response to chemotherapy and survival of cervical cancer patients. Therefore, we investigated: a) the expression level of EGFR in cervical squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (HSIL) versus non-neoplastic cervical squamous epithelium; b) the state of activation of the mTOR pathway in these same tissues; and c) any impact of these signal transduction molecules on cell cycle. Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue microarray blocks containing 20 samples each of normal cervix, HSIL and invasive SCC, derived from a total of 60 cases of cervical biopsies and cervical conizations were examined. Immunohistochemistry was utilized to detect the following antigens: EGFR; mTOR pathway markers, phosphorylated (p)-mTOR (Ser2448) and p-p70S6K (Thr389); and cell cycle associated proteins, Ki-67 and S phase kinase-associated protein (Skp)2. Protein compartmentalization and expression were quantified in regard to proportion (0-100%) and intensity (0-3+). Mitotic index (MI) was also assessed. An expression index (EI) for pmTOR, p-p70S6K and EGFR, respectively was calculated by taking the product of intensity score and proportion of positively staining cells. We found that plasmalemmal EGFR expression was limited to the basal/parabasal cells (2-3+, EI = 67) in normal cervical epithelium (NL), but was diffusely positive in all HSIL (EI = 237) and SCC (EI 226). The pattern of cytoplasmic p-mTOR and nuclear p-p70S6K expression was similar to that of EGFR; all showed a significantly increased EI in HSIL/SCC versus NL (p<0.02). Nuclear translocation of p-mTOR was observed in all SCC lesions (EI = 202) and was significantly increased versus both HSIL (EI = 89) and NL (EI = 54) with p<0.015 and p<0.0001, respectively. Concomitant increases in MI and proportion of nuclear Ki-67 and Skp2 expression were noted in HSIL and SCC. In conclusion, morphoproteomic analysis reveals constitutive activation and overexpression of the mTOR pathway in HSIL and SCC as evidenced by: increased nuclear translocation of pmTOR and p-p70S6K, phosphorylated at putative sites of activation, Ser2448 and Thr389, respectively; correlative overexpression of the upstream signal transducer, EGFR, and increases in cell cycle correlates, Skp2 and mitotic indices. These results suggest that the mTOR pathway plays a key role in cervical carcinogenesis and targeted therapies may be developed for SCC as well as its precursor lesion, HSIL.

Clinical relevance of polymorphic DNA copy number variation (CNV) in African American women with stage I-II breast cancer

Objectives. The chief goal of this study was to analyze copy number variation (CNV) in breast cancer tumors from 25 African American women with early stage breast cancer (BC) using molecular inversion probes (MIP) in order to: (1) compare the degree of CNV in tumors compared to normal lymph nodes, and (2) determine whether gains and/or losses of genes in specific chromosomes differ between pathologic subtypes of breast cancer defined by known prognostic markers, (3) determine whether gains/losses in CN are associated with known oncogenes or tumor suppressor genes, and (4) determine whether increased gains/losses in CN for specific chromosomes were associated with differences in breast cancer recurrence. ^ Methods. Twenty to 37 nanograms of DNA extracted from 25 formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) tumor samples and matched normal lymph nodes were added to individual tubes. Oligonucleotide probes with recognition sequences at each terminus were hybridized with a genomic target sequence to form a circular structure. Probes are released from genomic DNA obtained from FFPE samples, and those which have been correctly "circularized" in the proper allele/nucleotide reaction combination are amplified using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) primers. Amplicons were fluorescently labeled and the tag sequences released from the genome homology regions by treatment with uracil-N-glycosylase to cleave the probe at the site where uracils are present, and detected using a complementary tag array developed by Affymetrix. ^ Results. Analysis of CN gains and losses from tumors and normal tissues showed marked differences in tumors with numerous chromosomes affected. Similar changes were not observed in normal lymph nodes. When tumors were stratified into four groups based on expression or lack of expression of the estrogen receptor and HER2/neu, distinct patterns of CNV for different chromosomes were observed. Gains or losses in CN for specific chromosomes correlated with amplifications/deletions of particular oncogenes or tumor suppressor genes (i.e. such as found on chromosome 17) known to be associated with aggressive tumor phenotype and poor prognosis. There was a trend for increases in CN observed for chromosome 17 to correlate inversely with time to recurrence of BC (p=0.14 for trend). CNV was also observed for chromosomes 5, 8, 10, 11, and 16, which are known sites for several breast cancer susceptibility alleles. ^ Conclusions. This study is the first to validate the MIP technique, to correlate differences in gene expression with known prognostic tumor markers, and to correlate significant increases/decreases in CN with known tumor markers associated with prognosis. The results of this study may have far reaching public health implications towards identifying new high-risk groups based on genomic differences in CNP, both with respect to prognosis and response to therapy, and to eventually identify new therapeutic targets for prevention and treatment of this disease. ^

CD68+ cells of monocyte/macrophage lineage in the environment of AIDS-associated and classic-sporadic Kaposi sarcoma are singly or doubly infected with human herpesviruses 7 and 6B

Earlier studies have shown that Kaposi sarcomas contain cells infected with human herpesvirus (HHV) 6B, and in current studies we report that both AIDS-associated and classic-sporadic Kaposi sarcoma contain HHV-7 genome sequences detectable by PCR. To determine the distribution of HHV-7-infected cells relative to those infected with HHV-6, sections from paraffin-embedded tissues were allowed to react with antibodies to HHV-7 virion tegument phosphoprotein pp85 and to HHV-6B protein p101. The antibodies are specific for HHV-7 and HHV-6B, respectively, and they retained reactivity for antigens contained in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue samples. We report that (i) HHV-7 pp85 was present in 9 of 32 AIDS-associated Kaposi sarcomas, and in 1 of 7 classical-sporadic HIV-negative Kaposi sarcomas; (ii) HHV-7 pp85 was detected primarily in cells bearing the CD68 marker characteristic of the monocyte/macrophage lineage present in or surrounding the Kaposi sarcoma lesions; and (iii) in a number of Kaposi sarcoma specimens, tumor-associated CD68+ monocytes/macrophages expressed simultaneously antigens from both HHV-7 and HHV-6B, and therefore appeared to be doubly infected with the two viruses. CD68+ monocytes/macrophages infected with HHV-7 were readily detectable in Kaposi sarcoma, but virtually absent from other normal or pathological tissues that harbor macrophages. Because all of the available data indicate that HHV-7 infects CD4+ T lymphocytes, these results suggest that the environment of the Kaposi sarcoma (i) attracts circulating peripheral lymphocytes and monocytes, triggers the replication of latent viruses, and thereby increases the local concentration of viruses, (ii) renders CD68+ monocytes/macrophages susceptible to infection with HHV-7, and (iii) the combination of both events enables double infections of cells with both HHV-6B and HHV-7.

Cyclins as markers of tumor proliferation: immunocytochemical studies in breast cancer.

We have developed methods to use anticyclin A, B, and E antibodies as reagents to specifically detect proliferating cells in specific phases of the cell cycle in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded sections of tissues and cells. Staining of 48 archival cases of breast cancer showed that these antibodies estimate the tumor proliferation fraction and therefore are potentially useful for the prediction of prognosis. A subset of cancers had a high frequency of tumor cells expressing cyclins A and E, out of proportion to other proliferation markers, suggesting that these tumors may have deregulated cyclin expression. In addition to recognizing authentic cyclin E in the nucleus of proliferating cells, anticyclin E antibody cross-reacted with a cytoplasmic protein in nonproliferating endothelial cells. This cross-reaction allows the simultaneous visualization and quantitation of microvessels in the tumors, measuring a second potential predictor of breast cancer prognosis, tumor angiogenesis.