Sasaki H, Fujii Y, Masaoka A, Yamakawa Y, Fukai I, Kiriyama M, Saito Y, Matsui H
Department of Surgery II, Nagoya City University Medical School, Japan.
Eur J Cardiothorac Surg. 1997 Dec;12(6):885-91. doi: 10.1016/s1010-7940(97)00269-8.
Prothymosin-alpha, the precursor of thymosin-alpha1, may play a role in cell proliferation, and the plasma level of thymosin-alpha1 may reflect the degree of proliferation of the tumor cells.
Recently, a new sandwich immunoradiometric assay for thymosin-alpha1 was developed using monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies. In this investigation, we used this assay to measure plasma and tissue level of thymosin-alpha1 in 131 lung cancer patients.
We found that the mean plasma thymosin-alpha1 levels in lung cancer patients were higher than in normal individuals (P < 0.001). However, half of the patients showed normal levels. Thymosin-alpha1 levels correlated neither with the stage nor pathological subtype of the lung cancer, and did not decrease significantly in the 4 weeks after the resection of the tumor. Thymosin-alpha1 levels of lung cancer patients with another cancer were higher than those without evidence of other cancers (P = 0.03). Survival of patients with normal levels of plasma thymosin-alpha1 was significantly better than that with higher levels (P = 0.04).
The plasma level of thymosin-alpha1 may be used as a marker for the prognosis of lung cancer patients. Further investigations are warranted to determine its role in the lung cancer.
前胸腺素α是胸腺素α1的前体，可能在细胞增殖中发挥作用，而胸腺素α1的血浆水平可能反映肿瘤细胞的增殖程度。
最近，利用单克隆抗体和多克隆抗体开发了一种新的胸腺素α1夹心免疫放射分析方法。在本研究中，我们使用该方法测量了131例肺癌患者的血浆和组织中胸腺素α1的水平。
我们发现肺癌患者的血浆胸腺素α1平均水平高于正常个体（P < 0.001）。然而，一半的患者显示水平正常。胸腺素α1水平与肺癌的分期和病理亚型均无相关性，并且在肿瘤切除后的4周内没有显著下降。患有另一种癌症的肺癌患者的胸腺素α1水平高于没有其他癌症证据的患者（P = 0.03）。血浆胸腺素α1水平正常的患者的生存率显著优于水平较高的患者（P = 0.04）。
胸腺素α1的血浆水平可作为肺癌患者预后的标志物。有必要进行进一步研究以确定其在肺癌中的作用。
