Pelosi Giuseppe, Schianchi Elisabetta, Dell'orto Patrizia, Veronesi Giulia, Spaggiari Lorenzo, Pasini Felice, Sozzi Gabriella, Brambilla Elisabeth, Griso Claudia, Viale Giuseppe
Division of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, European Institute of Oncology and University of Milan School of Medicine, Milan, Italy.
Virchows Arch. 2006 Jan;448(1):7-15. doi: 10.1007/s00428-005-0087-z. Epub 2005 Sep 29.
Human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT), the catalytic subunity of telomerase, a marker of cell immortalization, is upregulated in most tumors, including nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC). However, little is known about the role of assessing cell-free plasma circulating hTERT mRNA for tracing these tumors. We investigated by RT-polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and real-time quantitative PCR the prevalence and functional implications of hTERT mRNA in both tumor tissue and paired plasma samples in 34 (27 males and 7 females) stages I-IIIB NSCLC patients (21 adenocarcinomas and 13 squamous-cell carcinomas) by using intron- and exon-spanning primers. Plasma samples of ten healthy volunteers and normal lung tissue were used as negative controls. We detected hTERT mRNA in the plasma of 4 out of 34 (12%) tumor patients, but none was detected in the ten plasma samples of healthy volunteers. Normal lung tissue was completely devoid of hTERT mRNA. No association was found between hTERT plasma mRNA and clinicopathologic variables of the patients' population. We conclude that cell-free circulating hTERT mRNA is detectable in a subset of patients, whereas it is consistently absent in healthy volunteers. It can be added to the panel of multiple genetic tracers to detect lung cancer in the plasma of patients, although, per se, it is not specific for this tumor.
人端粒酶逆转录酶（hTERT）是端粒酶的催化亚基，作为细胞永生化的标志物，在包括非小细胞肺癌（NSCLC）在内的大多数肿瘤中均呈上调表达。然而，关于评估游离血浆中循环hTERT mRNA在追踪这些肿瘤中的作用，目前所知甚少。我们通过逆转录聚合酶链反应（RT-PCR）和实时定量PCR，使用跨越内含子和外显子的引物，对34例（27例男性和7例女性）I-IIIB期NSCLC患者（21例腺癌和13例鳞状细胞癌）的肿瘤组织和配对血浆样本中hTERT mRNA的患病率及其功能意义进行了研究。十名健康志愿者的血浆样本和正常肺组织用作阴性对照。我们在34例肿瘤患者中的4例（12%）血浆中检测到了hTERT mRNA，但在十名健康志愿者的血浆样本中均未检测到。正常肺组织完全没有hTERT mRNA。hTERT血浆mRNA与患者群体的临床病理变量之间未发现关联。我们得出结论，在一部分患者中可检测到游离循环hTERT mRNA，而在健康志愿者中始终不存在。尽管它本身并非肺癌特异性标志物，但可添加到多种基因追踪物组合中，用于检测患者血浆中的肺癌。
