Identification of tumor‐associated proteins in oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma by proteomics

Abstract

Oral tongue carcinoma is an aggressive tumor that particularly affects chronic smokers, drinkers and betel squid chewers. Patients often present symptoms at a late stage, and there is a high recurrence rate after treatment. In this article, we report the first proteomic analysis of oral tongue carcinoma to globally search for tumor related proteins. Apart from helping us to understand the molecular pathogenesis of the carcinoma, these proteins may also have potential clinical applications as biomarkers, enabling the tumor to be identified at an early stage in high risk individuals, treatment response to be predicted, and residual or recurrent carcinoma to be detected sooner after treatment. The protein expression profiles of ten oral tongue squamous cell carcinomas and their matched normal mucosal resection margins were examined by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-time of flight mass spectroscopy. A number of tumor-associated proteins including heat shock protein (HSP)60, HSP27, alpha B-crystalline, ATP synthase beta, calgranulin B, myosin, tropomyosin and galectin 1 were consistently found to be significantly altered in their expression levels in tongue carcinoma tissues, compared with their paired normal mucosae. The expression profile portrays a global protein alteration that appears specific to oral tongue cancer. The potential of utilizing these tumor related proteins for screening cancer and monitoring recurrence warrants further investigation.

Proteomic analysis of protein expression in human tonsillar cancer differentially expressed proteins characterize human tonsillar cancer

“…It has been implicated that down-regulation of HSP 27 may confer to chemo-resistance associated with cellular growth delay [27]. Consistent with our findings of up-regulated HSP 27 in tonsillar cancer, other investigations on oral cancer have found a similar expression pattern of this protein [3,17,18].…”

“…It is known that S100A9 activates MAP-kinase and the NF-kB signalling pathways in human prostate cancer [20]. We found an up-regulated pattern of this protein in tonsillar cancer, a pattern that is well in line with previous publications, stating that this protein is up-regulated in tongue cancer [17]. In contrast, Roesch-Ely and coworkers published a down-regulation of S100A9 in HNSCC [21].…”

“…It is known that high expression of tubulins in tumor cells is associated with poor response to chemotherapy and a shorter progression-free survival [16]. To date, proteomics-based studies in head and neck cancer did not report expression changes in these proteins [2,3,17,18].…”

Increased expression of galectin-1 is associated with human oral squamous cell carcinoma development

“…Regarding OSCC, Gal-1 has been proved to be an OSCCrelated protein and gene (24). Chiang et al (25) showed that the overexpression of Gal-1 at OSCC invasive front was associated with poor prognosis.…”

Decreased expression of S100A6 in oral squamous cell carcinoma

“…In the research of the molecular mechanisms of diseases, comparative proteomic analysis has been used as an innovative method to investigate the protein expressions between cancerous and normal tissues/ cells. Several studies on OSCC have reported the application of comparative proteomic analysis in identifying differentially expressed proteins in tissue (28)(29)(30), cell (31,32), serum (33)(34)(35), and saliva (36,37). Many differentially expressed proteins have been identified between the cancerous and normal samples.…”