| Objective: Galectin-3 represents an endogenous galactoside-binding lectin which may be involved in a variety of biological events including cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis. The implication of galectin-3 during malignancy progression and metastasis has been suggested in several cancers, including thyroid, and breast cancer, however, scarce data are available in gastric cancer.To explore the correlation of expression pattern of Galectin-3 and Bcl-2 in stomach neoplasms tissures.Methods: The speciments were obtained from patients with gastric neoplasms who had undergone initial surgical resection. These speciments were formalia-fixed and paraffin-embeded. Tumors were histologically classified according to the International Union against cancer tumor-node-metastasis(TNM) classification.15 cases were collected at stadges 0ï½žâ… ,â…¡,â…¢andâ…£,respectively. In these patients,15 gastric normal tissures which adjacent to the neoplasms were randomly collected as control group. Each spaciments was investigated Galectin-3 and Bcl-2 expressions immunohistochemically using monoclonal antibody.Result: Positive rate of expression of Galectin-3 and Bcl-2are 76.7%,68.3% respectively in gastric cancer cases,whereas adjacent epithelial cells showed weak immunoreactivity about 20% and 40%. Galectin-3 has been observed to show a similar expression pattern to Bcl-2 in gastric neoplasms tissure. There was no relation between the expression pattern of galectin-3 and cell differentiation,but the expression of galectin-3 was stronger in gastic tissure with metastatic lymph nodes than in tissure with no metastatic lymph nodes. Conclusion: Galectin-3 and Bcl-2 might be a useful tumor marker for gastric cancers with respects to tumor progressions.The expressions of Galectin-3 and Bcl-2 in stomch neoplasms are thought to be correlates.It proposed that Galectin-3 and Bcl-2 should have the same apoptosis-inhibiting actives of intra-cellular signal transduction. |
