Anti-tumor activity of a combination of plasminogen activator and captopril in a human melanoma xenograft model.

Angiostatin, a proteolytic fragment of plasminogen consisting of the first 3 or 4 kringle domains, reduces tumor growth by specifically inhibiting tumor angiogenesis. Angiostatin is generated in vitro in a 2-step process. First, plasminogen is converted to plasmin by plasminogen activators.

The human SPANX multigene family: genomic organization, alignment and expression in male germ cells and tumor cell lines.

Multigenicity is one of the features of cancer/testis-associated genes. In the present study we analyzed the number and expression of genes of the SPANX(CTp11) family of cancer/testis-associated genes. Genomic database analysis, next to the four previously described SPANX genes, revealed the presence of a novel gene: SPANXE.

Cigarette smoking and genetic alterations in sporadic colon carcinomas.

Cigarette smoking has been inconsistently associated with colon cancer risk. To evaluate the hypothesis that smoking is primarily linked to a specific colon tumor subgroup(s), we assessed associations between smoking and the occurrence of mutations in the APC, K-ras and p53 genes, p53 overexpression, and microsatellite instability (MSI) in a Dutch population-based case-control study on sporadic colon carcinomas. The study population consisted of 176 cases and 249 controls.

The XAGE family of cancer/testis-associated genes: alignment and expression profile in normal tissues, melanoma lesions and Ewing's sarcoma.

The existence of XAGE genes was first reported after database homology searches for PAGE-like sequences identified 3 XAGE EST clusters. One of these clusters, XAGE-1, has in later studies been identified as a cancer/testis-associated gene. Here, we report the expression profiles of all 3 reported XAGE genes, as well as several splice variants of XAGE-1, in normal human tissues, Ewing's sarcoma and melanocytic tumors.

Characterization of XAGE-1b, a short major transcript of cancer/testis-associated gene XAGE-1, induced in melanoma metastasis.

Suppression subtractive hybridization, comparing mRNA expression profiles of common nevocellular nevi and melanoma metastases, was used to identify potential markers of melanoma progression. From the metastases we isolated XAGE-1b, a 470 bp transcript of the XAGE-1 gene. In general, expression of XAGE-1b was much more prominent than expression of the longer XAGE-1 transcript, isolated from Ewing's sarcoma.