Evidence for increased expression of tissue factor and protease-activated receptor-1 in human esophageal cancer.

It has been suggested that the blood clotting initiator protein, tissue factor (TF), participates in tumor growth, metastasis and angiogenesis. In addition, a family of G protein-coupled-receptors known as protease-activated receptors (PARs) has also been implicated in tumor biology. These receptors might be activated by blood coagulation proteases thus eliciting a number of pro-tumoral responses, including the expression of interleukin-8 (IL-8).

Lower expression of p14ARF and p16INK4a correlates with higher DNMT3B expression in human oesophageal squamous cell carcinomas.

Oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is one of the most common malignancies and is the sixth cause of cancer-related death in the world. Inactivation of cell-cycle regulating genes, such as p14ARF and p16INK4a, and cell adhesion genes, such as E-cadherin, is common in cancer, and results from genetic and/or epigenetic alterations. Therefore, we have analysed the mRNA expression of p14ARF, p16INK4a and E-cadherin in 17 matched ESCC and normal mucosal samples obtained from Brazilian patients by semi-quantitative RT-PCR.