AI Article Synopsis
- Lactoferrin (LF) is an iron-binding glycoprotein found in various human bodily fluids, notably in milk and colostrum, and is recognized for its multifunctional roles.
- Numerous studies since the late 1970s have explored LF's distribution in human tissues, particularly in normal and cancerous tissues.
- This review compiles existing literature and 25 years of original research to analyze LF's immunohistochemical presence in tumors, aiming to understand its potential role in cancer development and pathology across different tissues.
Article Abstract
Lactoferrin (LF) is an iron-binding glycoprotein of the transferrin family, today known to have multifunctional physiological activities. In humans, under normal conditions, LF has been found in blood, mucosal secretions, gastrointestinal fluids, urine and mostly in milk and colostrum. The first pioneering immunohistochemical report about LF distribution in human tissues dated in 1978; successively, many studies have been performed to analyze the LF immunohistochemical pattern in different normal and neoplastic tissues. In this review, we present data from literature concerning the evidence of LF in tumors together with those by us obtained during more than 25 years; the immunohistochemical applications to human neoplastic tissues have been done to investigate the LF pathogenetic role as well as its activity in cancer. After a systematic analysis of LF immunoreactivity in different human districts, a possible explanation for its presence and function has been modulated for each site or tissue, according to experimental evidences obtained either by in vivo as well as by in vitro studies.
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| http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10534-011-9450-5 | DOI Listing |
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