Aberrant Expression of , , , Splicing Variants of and in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia Patients.

Functional toll-like receptors (TLRs) could modulate anti-tumor effects by activating inflammatory cytokines and the cytotoxic T-cells response. However, excessive TLR expression could promote tumor progression, since TLR-induced inflammation might stimulate cancer cells expansion into the microenvironment. Myd88 is involved in activation NF-κB through TLRs downstream signaling, hence in the current study we provided, for the first time, a complex characterization of expression of , , , and as well as their splicing forms in two distinct compartments of the microenvironment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL): peripheral blood and bone marrow. We found correlations between and expressions in both compartments, indicating their relevant cooperation in CLL. The expression was higher in CLL patients compared to healthy volunteers (HVs) (0.1780 vs. 0.128, < 0.0001). The TLRs expression was aberrant in CLL compared to HVs. Analysis of survival curves revealed a shorter time to first treatment in the group of patients with low level of expression compared to high level of expression in bone marrow (13 months vs. 48 months, = 0.0207). We suggest that expression is differentially regulated in CLL but is similarly shared between two distinct compartments of the microenvironment.