Prognostic factors and epidemiological characteristics of cutaneous and mucosal head and neck melanoma.

OBJECTIVE. To describe the prognostic factors and epidemiological characteristics of cutaneous and mucosal head and neck melanoma and to identify the variables associated with mortality from this disease. MATERIAL AND METHODS.

Evaluation of T7 and lambda phage display systems for survey of autoantibody profiles in cancer patients.

In the current study we attempted to evaluate the suitability of T7 Select 10-3b and lambdaKM8 phage display systems for the identification of antigens eliciting B cell responses in cancer patients and the production of phage-displayed antigen microarrays that could be exploited for the monitoring of autoantibody profiles. Members of 15 tumour-associated antigen (TAA) families were cloned into both phage display vectors and the TAA mini-libraries were immunoscreened with 22 melanoma patients' sera resulting in the detection of reactivity against members of 5 antigen families in both systems, yet with variable sensitivity. T7 phage display system showed greater sensitivity for the detection of antibodies against members of CTAG, MAGEA and GAGE families, both systems showed equal performance in detecting the reactivity against MAGEC and SSX2 while only lambdaKM8 allowed the detection of anti-CTAGE5 antibodies.