Department of Neurology, Xijing Hospital, The Fourth Military Medical University, 127 Changle Xi Road, 710032 Xi'an, China.
J Neurol Sci. 2011 Sep 15;308(1-2):77-82. doi: 10.1016/j.jns.2011.06.007. Epub 2011 Jun 25.
The pathological grading system of human astrocytoma is usually used to evaluate the outcomes of brain glioma patients. However, it is true that some astrocytoma patients with similar grades underwent obvious discrepancy in survival. Increasing evidence shows that certain tumor biomarkers are more suitable for prognosis assessment of tumors than the grading system. NDRG2, a member of the N-myc downstream-regulated gene family, plays an important role in cell proliferation and differentiation, but whether it can be used as a biomarker for prognosis assessment of astrocytomas remains unknown.
Immunohistochemistry and semi-quantitative RT-PCR were performed to examine the expression profile of NDRG2 in human astrocytoma specimens. Spearman correlation coefficient was used to describe the association between NDRG2 expression and the clinical parameters of astrocytoma patients.
Our results showed that both protein and mRNA expression levels of NDRG2 were significantly downregulated in astrocytomas. In the analysis of the relationship of NDRG2 expression with pathological grades of astrocytoma and with patient survival rate, we found that NDRG2 expression was negatively correlated with pathological grading but positively with the life span of astrocytoma patients.
NDRG2 can serve as a potential prognostic biomarker for human astrocytoma.
人类星形细胞瘤的病理分级系统通常用于评估脑胶质瘤患者的预后。然而，确实有一些具有相似分级的星形细胞瘤患者的生存情况存在明显差异。越来越多的证据表明，某些肿瘤标志物比分级系统更适合评估肿瘤的预后。NDRG2 是 N-myc 下游调节基因家族的成员，在细胞增殖和分化中发挥重要作用，但它是否可作为星形细胞瘤预后评估的标志物尚不清楚。
采用免疫组织化学和半定量 RT-PCR 方法检测 NDRG2 在人星形细胞瘤标本中的表达谱。采用 Spearman 相关系数描述 NDRG2 表达与星形细胞瘤患者临床参数之间的相关性。
我们的结果表明，NDRG2 的蛋白和 mRNA 表达水平在星形细胞瘤中均显著下调。在分析 NDRG2 表达与星形细胞瘤的病理分级和患者生存率的关系时，我们发现 NDRG2 的表达与病理分级呈负相关，与星形细胞瘤患者的生存期呈正相关。
NDRG2 可作为人类星形细胞瘤的潜在预后标志物。
