Breast cancer (BC) is the most common neoplasm among women in most developed countries, including Egypt. Elevated levels of certain proteins in human BC are associated with unfavorable prognosis and progressive stages of the disease. The aim of our study was to evaluate the protein expression profile and prognostic significance of cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2), matrix metalloproteinase-2 (MMP-2), MMP-9 and membrane type 1-MMP (MT1-MMP) and their interaction in operable BC patients. The protein expression of COX-2, MMP-2 and MT1-MMP were evaluated by western blot technique, whereas enzymatic activity of MMP-2 and MMP-9 was determined by zymography in 47 breast cancer patients as well as normal adjacent tissues. Also, the correlation between these proteins and age, tumor size, LN stage, TNM stage, estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor, disease-free survival, and overall survival (OS) has been investigated. As compared to adjacent normal tissues, COX-2, MMP-2 and MT1-MMP were over-expressed in 43, 64, and 60 % of tumor tissues, respectively. In the same pattern, the activity of MMP-2 (62 %) and MMP-9 (45 %) was elevated in BC tissues. Multivariate analysis showed a positive correlation between the protein expression of COX-2, MMP-2, and MT1-MMP and the activity of MMP-2 and MMP-9 in BC patients. However, the enzymatic activity showed no correlation with clinicopathological features. This study confirms the preclinical evidence that COX-2 increased the expression of MT1-MMP, which in turn activates MMP-2. The lack of correlation with clinicopathological features, OS or disease-free survival ascertains the complexity of tumor progression and metastasis with many pro- and counter regulatory factors.

Twenty eight pre-identified fungal isolates and strains were tested qualitatively for their cellulolytic activities, among which 12 superior producers were quantitatively tested. Three Aspergillus spp. namely A5, A6 and A7 were found to be the best cellulolytic fungi, while both Aspergillus terreus NRRL260 and Phanerochaete chrysosporium NRRL6361 were found to be the best xylanase producers. On solid state fermentation (SSF) using pretreated rice straw (RS), the Aspergillus spp. A5, A6 and A7 gave total cellulases (as FPase), exocellulases (as CMCase) and cellobiase (as β-glucosidase) activities of ≥ 16, 130 and 21U.g-1 ds, respectively. On the other hand, Aspergillus terreus NRRL260 showed maximum xylanases activity of 804 U.g-1 ds. The recovered crude enzymes forming the crude enzyme mixture (CEM) was concentrated (LCEM), ammonium sulfate fractionated (PPE1), were semi-purified by gel permeation on Sephadex G100 and finally lyophilized to powder form (PPE2). The resulting cellulases specific activities were 0.50, 0.68, 1.01 and 1.47 U.mg-1 , respectively. Those purification and concentration steps resulted in purification fold increase by 1.28, 2.08 and 2.78 for LCEM, PPE1 and PPE2, respectively. PPE2 achieved maximum degree of saccharification (DoS) at enzyme load ≥ 10 FPU, substrate concentration ≥ 5% and incubation period after 48 hr to be 85%, 87% and 88%, respectively.