Back to Journals » OncoTargets and Therapy » Volume 6

Sam68 is a novel marker for aggressive neuroblastoma

Authors Zhao X, Li Z, He B, Liu J, Li S, Zhou L, Pan C, Yu Z, Xu Z

Received 7 August 2013

Accepted for publication 22 September 2013

Published 2 December 2013 Volume 2013:6 Pages 1751—1760

DOI https://doi.org/10.2147/OTT.S52643

Checked for plagiarism Yes

Review by Single anonymous peer review

Peer reviewer comments 3



Xiaohong Zhao,1,* Zuoqing Li,2,* Benfu He,3 Juncheng Liu,2 Suisheng Li,2 Li Zhou,2 Cuiling Pan,2 Zhe Yu,4 Zhe Xu2

1State Key Laboratory of Oncology in Southern China, Department of Experimental Research, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, 2Department of Pediatric Surgery, First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, 3Oncology Department, PLA421 Hospital, 4Laura Biotech Co, Ltd, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China

*These authors contributed equally to this work

Background: Neuroblastoma (NB) is the most common solid extracranial tumor in children. However, the molecular mechanism and progression of NB is largely unknown, and unfortunately, the prognosis is poor. Src-associated in mitosis with a molecular weight of 68 kDa (Sam68) is associated with carcinogenesis and neurogenesis. The present study aimed to investigate the clinical and prognostic significance of Sam68 in NB.
Methods: The expression of Sam68 in immortalized normal epithelial cells, NB cell lines, and in four cases of paired NB tissue and adjacent normal tissue from the same patient was examined using Western blotting, reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and real-time reverse transcription-PCR. The proliferation of NB cells was determined by 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay. Furthermore, Sam68 protein expression was analyzed in 90 NB cases characterized as clinicopathological using immunohistochemistry. Statistical analyses were applied to evaluate the diagnostic value and associations of Sam68 with clinical parameters.
Results: Western blotting and reverse transcription-PCR showed that the expression level of Sam68 was markedly higher in NB cell lines than in the immortalized normal epithelial cells at both messenger RNA and protein levels. The MTT assay revealed that Sam68 expression supported proliferation of NB cells. Sam68 expression levels were significantly up-regulated in tumor tissues in comparison to the matched adjacent normal tissues from the same patient. Sam68 protein level was positively correlated with clinical stage (P<0.001), tumor histology (P<0.001), and distant metastasis (P=0.029). Patients with higher Sam68 expression had shorter overall survival time, whereas those with lower tumor Sam68 expression had longer survival time.
Conclusion: Our results suggest that Sam68 expression is associated with neuroblastoma progression and may represent a novel and valuable predictor for prognostic evaluation of neuroblastoma patients.

Keywords: Sam68, biomarker, prognosis, neuroblastoma

Corrigendum for this paper has been published

Creative Commons License © 2013 The Author(s). This work is published and licensed by Dove Medical Press Limited. The full terms of this license are available at https://www.dovepress.com/terms.php and incorporate the Creative Commons Attribution - Non Commercial (unported, v3.0) License. By accessing the work you hereby accept the Terms. Non-commercial uses of the work are permitted without any further permission from Dove Medical Press Limited, provided the work is properly attributed. For permission for commercial use of this work, please see paragraphs 4.2 and 5 of our Terms.