Greengard O, Head J F, Goldberg S L, Kirschner P A
Cancer Res. 1986 May;46(5):2600-5.
Analyses of enzymes from various metabolic pathways in pulmonary carcinoid tumors and radiological measurements of their volume increase were compared with those for lung carcinomas of various cell types. The results describe new biochemical features in carcinoid tumors, present the first quantitative evidence for their slow growth rate (i.e., long doubling time) in vivo, and show that measurement of 2 or 3 appropriate enzymes in biopsy samples can guard against instances in which carcinoids and adeno- or oat cell carcinomas are mistaken for one another on histological examination. The uridine kinase to thymidine kinase ratio as well as the beta-galactosidase concentration of carcinoid tumors were 5 times higher than of carcinomas, and their gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase was below that of all 35 adeno- and the 11 squamous cell carcinomas. Thymidine kinase, which bears a quantitative inverse correlation to volume doubling time (irrespective of cell type), had much lower titers in the 9 carcinoids than in the 6 oat cell carcinomas and reflects most clearly their very different (despite common histogenesis) clinical malignancy. Owing to their long doubling time, carcinoid tumors on the average required a much longer period (40.5 years) to attain final volume than did carcinomas (17.8 years). The calculated mean age of the subjects when growth began, -0.5 years (as opposed to 51 years for carcinomas), suggests a prenatal or early childhood inception for pulmonary carcinoid tumors.
对肺类癌肿瘤中各种代谢途径的酶进行分析，并将其体积增加的放射学测量结果与不同细胞类型肺癌的相应结果进行比较。结果描述了类癌肿瘤新的生化特征，首次提供了其在体内生长缓慢（即倍增时间长）的定量证据，并表明在活检样本中检测2或3种合适的酶可以避免在组织学检查中将类癌与腺癌或燕麦细胞癌相互误诊的情况。类癌肿瘤的尿苷激酶与胸苷激酶的比值以及β-半乳糖苷酶浓度比癌高5倍，其γ-谷氨酰转肽酶低于所有35例腺癌和11例鳞状细胞癌。胸苷激酶与体积倍增时间呈定量负相关（与细胞类型无关），在9例类癌中的滴度远低于6例燕麦细胞癌，最清楚地反映了它们截然不同的（尽管组织发生相同）临床恶性程度。由于类癌肿瘤的倍增时间长，其达到最终体积平均所需的时间（40.5年）比癌（17.8年）长得多。计算得出的生长开始时受试者的平均年龄为-0.5岁（而癌为51岁），提示肺类癌肿瘤起源于产前或儿童早期。
