The Expression And Significant Of Thmidylate Synthase And Thymidine Phosphorylase In Gastric And Colorectal Carcinoma

OBJECTIVE:K To detect the expression of thymidylate synthase (TS) and thymidinephosphorylase (TP) in gastric and colorectal carcinomas from patients undergoing surgery and postoperative FU-based chemotherapy and investigate their relationship with clinicopathologic characteristics including prognosis of the patients. To evaluate whether the expression of TS and TP could serve as a chemotherapeutic efficacy index in patient with gastric or colorectal carcinoma.2 ^ To study the relationship between tumor TP expression and angiogenesis.3 ^ To compare the result of immunohistochemical technique with that of Western Blotting in measuring the level of TS in gastric and colorectal carcinoma.METHODS1 >the expression of TS and TP in 70 cases of advanced gastric carcinomas,50 cases of colorectal carcinomas and their control cases wereimmunohistochemically assessed. Intratumoral microvessel density (MVD)was detected by using anti-CD34 monoclonal antibody.2-, The expression of TS in 34 cases of gastric and colorectal carcinomawere examined by immunohistochemical staining and Western blottingtechniques.3^ The results were analyzed using computer aided imaging analysistechnique.RESULTS1 The expression level of TS in normal gastrointestinal tissues was higherthan that in gastrointestinal carcinomas. The level of TS in gastric carcinomas was higher than that in colorectal carcinomas. The level of TS hi well-differentiated gastrointestinal carcinomas was higher than that in poor-differentiated cancers. There was an inverse association between the level of tumor TS expression and clinical prognosis. The level of TS showed no correlation with age, sex and lymph node metastases. 2 The expression level of TP in gastrointestinal carcinomas was higher than that in normal gastrointestinal tissues. The cases with lymph node metastasis showed higher level of TP than the cases without lymph node metastasis. The level of TP in gastrointestinal carcinomas was association with intratumoral MVD. There was a correlation between the level of tumor TP expression and clinical prognosis. The level of TS showed no correlation with age, sex and histological grades.3 The results of immunohistochemical staining were consistent with the results of Western blotting.CONCLUSION: The expression of TS and TP can serve as a FU-based chemotherapeutic efficacy index in patients with gastric or colorectal carcinoma. The expression of TP in gastric or colorectal carcinoma is closely correlated with angiogenesis.