HtrA1, a potential predictor of response to cisplatin-based combination chemotherapy in gastric cancer.

Aims: HtrA1 is a member of the HtrA (high-temperature requirement factor A) family of serine proteases. HtrA1 plays a protective role in various malignancies due to its tumour suppressive properties. The aim of this study was to determine HtrA1 expression as a predictor of chemoresponse in patients with advanced gastric cancer.

Prognostic role of human equilibrative transporter 1 (hENT1) in patients with resected gastric cancer.

Nucleoside transporter proteins are specialized proteins that mediate the transport of nucleosides and nucleoside analog drugs across the plasma membrane. The human equilibrative nucleoside transporter 1 (hENT1) is a member of these proteins and mediates cellular entry of gemcitabine, cytarabine, and fludarabine. The hENT1 expression has been demonstrated to be related with prognosis and activity of gemcitabine-based therapy in breast, ampullary, lung, and pancreatic cancer.

Immunohistochemical study of dendritic cells in foetal skin and lymph-nodes supporting the hypothesis for the neural crest origin of Langerhans cells.

An immunohistochemical study on foetal skin and lymph-nodes was undertaken in 35 foetuses with the aim to obtain some evidence supporting the hypothesis for the neural crest origin of the Langerhans cells (LCs).Specimens from the axillary and inguinal areas including the skin, subcutaneous tissues and lymph-nodes have been examined. For immunohistochemistry a panel of antibodies were used such as CD1, Langerin, Melan A, HMB45, S100 protein, CD21, subsets for B and T lymphocytes, CD68, Myeloperoxidase, CD31 and CD34.

Intratumoural FOXP3-positive regulatory T cells are associated with adverse prognosis in radically resected gastric cancer.

We investigated the clinical significance of tumour-infiltrating FOXP3-positive regulatory T cells (Tregs) in radically resected (R0) gastric cancer. From a single-institution database, tumors of 110 patients who underwent R0 resection for stage II-III disease were studied for FOXP3-positive Tregs by immunohistochemistry. The observed median number of FOXP3-positive Tregs was used as the cut-point in analyses (<6 versus >or=6 count).