β-catenin在原发性肝细胞癌中的表达及其临床意义

The expression of β-catenin and its clinical significance in primary hepatocellular carcinoma(HCC)

目的探讨肝细胞癌肝癌(hepatocellular carcinoma,HCC)β-catenin的表达与HCC临床病理特征的关系。方法应用Envsion法检测333例HCC,168例癌旁肝组织及89例正常肝组织的β-catenin表达;RT-PCR检测37例HCC及癌旁组织,肝癌细胞株HepG2和正常肝细胞株LO2的β-catenin mRNA表达。结果β-catenin在HCC胞质、胞核的阳性表达率为79%/37%;在癌旁和正常肝组织中的表达率为72%/0%、70%/0%。差异均有统计学意义(P均<0.05)。且分化好的癌细胞表达低,分化差的细胞表达高。同时,HCC和HepG2的β-catenin mRNA表达高于癌旁组织及LO2的表达。结论肝细胞癌的β-catenin过表达提示其在癌的发生过程中可能起着促癌的作用。

Objective To investigate the expression of β-catenin and its correlation with the clinicopathological features in hepatoeellular carcinoma （HCC）. Methods Evaluated the expression of β-eatenin by immunohistochemistry including 333 HCC tissues, 168 adjacent non-tumor liver tissues and 89 normal liver tissues, mRNA levels of β-catenin from 37 cases of HCC and their adjacent non-tumor tissues, HCC cell line HepG2 and normal liver cell line LO2 were analyzed by RT-PCR. Results The rate of cytoplasmic β-catenin expression was 79%, 72% and 70%, and the rate of nuclear β-eatenin expression was 37%, 0% and 0% respectively in HCC, adjacent non-tumor liver tissues and normal liver tissues. The positive rate of cytoplasmic/nuclear β-catenin was significantly higher in HCC than in adjacent nontumor liver tissues and normal liver tissues （P〈0.05）. Increased cytoplasmic/nuclear β-eatenin was correlation with Ed- mondson-steiner grade. Moreover, the level of β-catenin mRNA was significantly higher in HCC tissues than in adja- cent non-tumor tissues, and overexpressed in HepG2 than in LO2. Conclusion β-catenin is frequently high expressed in HCC suggesting, the overexpression of β-catenin may sustain the tumor progression.