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Background and aim The BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 genes are associated with an inherited susceptibility to breast cancer with a cumulative risk of 60% in BRCA 1 mutation carriers and of 30% in BRCA 2 mutation carriers. Several lifestyle factors could play a role in determining an individual’s risk of breast cancer. Obesity, changes in body size or unhealthy lifestyle habits such as smoking, alcohol consumption and physical inactivity have been evaluated as possible determinants of breast cancer risk. The aim of this study was to explore the current understanding of the role of harmful lifestyle and obesity or weight change in the development of breast cancer in female carriers of BRCA 1/2 mutations. Methods Articles were identified from MEDLINE in October 2020 utilizing related keywords; they were then read and notes, study participants, measures, data analysis and results were used to write this review. Results Studies with very large case series have been carried out but only few of them have shown consistent results. Additional research would be beneficial to better determine the actual role and impact of such factors.

Background Environmental factors may influence the lifetime risk of cancer (penetrance) in women with a BRCA mutation. Materials and methods In 89 BRCA-mutant women, affected or unaffected by breast/ovarian cancer, we explored serum levels of adipokines and their relation with the polymorphism SNP276G>T as modulators of BRCA penetrance. Results Affected women had significantly lower adiponectin than healthy women. Affected women with rs1501299 TT had significantly lower adiponectin and higher leptin than GT and GG genotypes. GT genotype was significantly associated with the disease status [odds ratio (OR)=3.24, 95% confidence interval (95% CI)=1.03-10.17]. Women in the lower tertile of serum adiponectin had a RR of BRCA-associated cancer of 2.80, 95% CI=1.1-7.1 (p for trend=0.03) compared with women in the higher tertile. Conclusion In the SNP rs1501299 the T allele was significantly associated with lower serum levels of adiponectin in affected women, suggesting that the T allele might be related to cancer.

Epidemiological and clinical studies support the association between nutrition and development or progression of different malignancies such as colon, breast, and prostate cancer, defining these tumors as diet-associated cancer. The Mediterranean diet shows inverse associations with metabolic diseases, cardiovascular pathologies and various types of cancer. Many bioactive nutrients of the Mediterranean diet have been identified as factors protective against these types of pathologies. The epigenome has been identified as the primary goal of modulations in gene expression related to these molecular nutrients. In fact, they can modify the epigenome and can be incorporated into the 'epigenetic diet', which translates into a diet regimen that can be used therapeutically for health or preventative purposes. Most epigenetic changes are influenced by lifestyle and nutrition. Epigenetic therapy is a new area for the development of nutraceuticals whose absence of toxicity can represent a valid asset in cancer prevention strategies. Recent advances in understanding the mechanisms of nutrigenomics, nutrigenetics and nutraceuticals have led to the identification of superfoods capable of favorably conditioning gene expression. In this review, we highlight the importance of nutraceuticals present in the Mediterranean diet as epigenetic modifiers both in the mechanisms of tumor onset and as protective agents.

Background: Environmental factors may influence the lifetime risk of cancer (penetrance) in women with a BRCA mutation. Materials and Methods: In 89 BRCA-mutant women, affected or unaffected by breast/ovarian cancer, we explored serum levels of adipokines and their relation with the polymorphism SNP276G>T as modulators of BRCA penetrance. Results: Affected women had significantly lower adiponectin than healthy women. Affected women with rs1501299 TT had significantly lower adiponectin and higher leptin than GT and GG genotypes. GT genotype was significantly associated with the disease status [odds ratio (OR)=3.24, 95% confidence interval (95% CI)=1.03-10.17]. Women in the lower tertile of serum adiponectin had a RR of BRCA-associated cancer of 2.80, 95% CI=1.1-7.1 (p for trend=0.03) compared with women in the higher tertile. Conclusion: In the SNP rs1501299 the T allele was significantly associated with lower serum levels of adiponectin in affected women, suggesting that the T allele might be related to cancer.

Matrix metalloproteinases are a family of zinc endopeptidases with proteolytic activity against the extracellular matrix components. In particular, two members of this family named Gelatinase A and B, as amply documented in the literature, play a key role in the process of tumor growth/metastasis in breast and hepatocellular carcinoma. Their activity is regulated by Tissue Inhibitor of metalloproteinases-1 and -2, which are the physiological inhibitor of Gelatinases A and B respectively. The aim of this review is to determine the current understanding of the clinical and prognostic role of Metalloproteinases-2 and -9 and their inhibitors in the course of breast cancer and liver diseases. Forty-one articles were selected from PubMed by entering the following keywords: liver diseases, breast cancer, MMP-2, TIMP-2; all articles were read and notes were made regarding the number of enrolled patients, pathology, measures, results and these data were used to write this review. Over-expression of both gelatinases is associated with the relapse of disease, metastasis, shorter overall survival in breast cancer and hepatocellular carcinoma and invasion and progression to tumors in chronic liver diseases, and MMPs/TIMPs ratio could be useful in the follow-up of these patients.

The development of molecular-targeted therapy with TKIs has fundamentally changed the outcome of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) improving dramatically long-term survival in the majority of patients...

Although several molecular markers have been proposed as prognostic of disease progression in Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), predictive markers of response to treatment are still unsatisfactory. Here, we propose a genetic polymorphism as a potential predictive factor of poor prognosis in HCC patients treated with transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE). In particular, we show that the guanosine insertion/deletion polymorphism in the promoter region of SERPINE1 gene at the −675 bp position, named 4G/4G, predicts poor prognosis in a cohort of 75 patients with HCC undergoing TACE. By a combination of ELISA and SERPINE1 promoter study, we found that the presence of elevated plasma levels of plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) in patients with 4G/4G genotype is significantly associated with reduced overall survival compared to patients with 5G/5G or 4G/5G genotype in HCC patients after TACE. Our analysis provided evidence that variation in SERPINE1 gene plays a role in defining the outcome in patients treated with TACE. In addition to a poor disease outcome, the 4G/4G variant represents an unfavorable predictive factor for response to chemotherapy as well.

Colorectal cancer is the most common cancer of the gastrointestinal system and has a marked preference to metastasize to distant organs. In this study, we investigated whether levels of circulating serum pro-angiogenic cytokine such as chemokine (C-X-C motif) ligand 1 (melanoma growth-stimulating activity, alpha; CXCL1) and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) have a role in favoring the colonization of metastatic cells at preferential sites and determined their prognostic significance in a cohort of 103 patients with metastatic colorectal cancer. Importantly, we found that the presence of elevated circulating levels of VEGF and CXCL1 are predictive of liver and lung metastasis, respectively. Moreover, the presence of a high serum VEGF level represents a negative prognostic factor for patients with liver metastases, with a worse prognosis than patients with lung metastasis. This suggests an additional role for circulating cytokines as a predictive tool for cancer prognosis and diagnosis, as well as for assessment of tumor sensitivity to anticancer therapy.

Background Tryptase is a serine protease released from mast cells that plays a role in tumor angiogenesis. In this study we aimed to evaluate serum tryptase levels in 105 female early breast cancer patients before (STLBS) and after (STLAS) radical surgical resection, mast cell density positive to tryptase (MCDPT) and microvascular density (MVD). Methods STLBS and STLAS were assessed using the UniCAP Tryptase Fluoroenzyme immunoassay. Tumor sections were immunostained with a primary anti-tryptase antibody and an anti-CD-34 antibody by means of immunohistochemistry. Results The mean ± 1 standard deviation STLBS and STLAS was 7.18 ± 2.63 μg/L, and 5.13 ± 2.21 respectively and a significant difference between mean levels was found (p = 0.0001) by student t-test. A strong correlation between STLBS and MVD (r = 0.81, p = 0.0001); STLBS and MCDPT (r = 0.69, p = 0.003); and MCDPT and MVD (r = 0.77; p = 0.0001) was found. Conclusions Results demonstrated higher STLBS in breast cancer patients, indicating an involvement of MC tryptase in breast cancer angiogenesis. Therefore, serum tryptase levels may play a role as a novel surrogate angiogenic marker predictive of response to radical surgery in breast cancer patients. In this patients setting, it’s intriguing to hypothesize that tryptase inhibitors might be evaluated in clinical trials.

Colon carcinoma is a malignant tumor showing a marked preference to metastasize to distant organs. The presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the peripheral blood is a prerequisite for the formation of distant metastases. However, whether circulating cytokines are linked to the circulation of tumor cells, as individual cells or clusters, remain unclear. In this study, we investigated the circulating levels of TGF-beta, CXCL1, VEGF and PAI-1 as potential bioindicators of the presence of CTCs in patients with metastatic colon cancer.Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) were isolated from peripheral blood by immunomagnetic separation and phenotypically characterized in a cohort of 103 patients with metastatic colon cancer. TGF-beta, CXCL1, VEGF and PAI-1 concentrations were determined by immunoassay in plasma samples from the same patients.We detected two different populations of CTCs, single cells or clusters in patients with metastatic colon cancer. Importantly, we found that the presence of clustered CTCs is significantly associated with elevated circulating levels of TGF-beta and CXCL1 and with reduced overall survival. Finally, we observed that circulating levels of cytokines are differently associated with the two populations of CTCs.Taken together, these findings show that detection of clustered CTCs represents a negative prognostic factor in patients with metastatic colon cancer. The presence of clustered CTCs is associated with elevated circulating levels of cytokines such as TGF-beta and CXCL1. This suggests an additional role for circulating cytokines as predictive tool for cancer prognosis and diagnosis of minimal residual disease as well as assessment of tumor sensitivity to anticancer therapy.

The presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the peripheral blood is a prerequisite for the formation of distant metastases. Transforming growth factor-βeta (TGF-β) and Chemokine (C-X-C Motif) Ligand-1 (CXCL1) are cytokines involved in the colonization of distant sites by CTCs in several pre-clinical animal models. However, their role is poorly-investigated in patients with metastatic cancer. Here, we investigated whether circulating levels of TGF-β and CXCL1 are predictors of CTC seeding in preferential distant sites in patients with metastatic breast cancer.CTCs were isolated from the peripheral blood of 61 patients with metastatic breast cancer by immunomagnetic separation. Plasma samples were collected from the same patients and assayed for TGF-β and CXCL1 by enzyme-linked immunoassay.Patients were grouped in CK1+/- (N10), CK2+ (N ≥ 1050) and CK3+ (N ≥ 50), according to the number (N) of cytokeratin 7/8-positive CTCs: the highest number of CK7/8-positive CTCs was detected in patients with negative Human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER-2/NEU) status (p0.0001) antigen, identified by the monoclonal antibody Ki-67 (Ki-67) ≥ 15% (p=0.003), Carcinoma antigen 15-3 (CA-15.3) ≥ 40 U/ml (p=0.004) and those with lung metastases (p=0.01). We found that elevated plasma concentrations of TGF-β and CXCL1 are predictive for the detection of CTCs. In particular, patients with CK3+ CTCs and plasma concentrations of TGF-β and CXCL1 higher than the median value had a poor prognosis in comparison to patients with CK1+/- CTCs and TGF-β and CXCL1 concentrations below the median value.Our study shows that elevated circulating levels of TGF-β and CXCL1 are associated with a poor prognosis, and higher detection of CTCs and propensity of these cells to seed lung metastases in patients with breast cancer.

The discovery of new target treatments for NSCLC has led to a search for new genetic and epigenetic markers able to selectively predict response to these new drugs. Somatic mutations in EGFR and KRAS genes are routinely analyzed to predict response to tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs), used in the treatment of NSCLC patients, whose efficacy depend on the presence or the absence of specific mutations. MicroRNA (miRNA) expression evaluation has been recently analyzed because of the involvement of these molecules in lung cancer pathogenesis and in drug resistance. Only 30 % of NSCLC patients present a resectable stage at time of diagnosis so tissue samples cannot be the only starting material for genetic and epigenetic analysis. Therefore, the possibility to use cytological sampling already used for diagnosis also for molecular testing is emerging. The aim of this study was to evaluate for the first time in lung cancer the use of liquid-based cytology both for EGFR and KRAS mutational testing and for the expression trend of some miRNAs involved in lung cancer pathogenesis: miR-21, miR-155, miR-7, and let7a. We enrolled 20 fine-needle aspirate (FNA) samples diagnosed as NSCLC, 10 FNAs without neoplastic cells, and tissue samples coming from 5 of the 20 patients who underwent surgery after FNA NSCLC diagnosis. All Thin-Prep processed FNA samples were evaluable for DNA and RNA analysis and results were compared with those of the small group of patients whose matched tumor histology was available. The mutational status of the EGFR and KRAS genes and the expression profile of the selected miRNA showed comparable results between FNA samples and histological tissues. Our results underline that cytological samples could give the same genetic information as that obtained from histological specimens and so could be collected to create a nucleic acids bank.

e23280Background: Adiponectin (APN), the product of the ADIPOQ gene, is sited on chromosome 3q27, which is linked to a susceptibility locus for metabolic syndrome (MetS). MetS is associated with an...

The objective of the study was to quantify the human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) gene in the circulating DNA of patients with primary breast cancer (BC) and to test its correlation with clinical parameters of the disease.One hundred and twenty-one BC patients, 30 patients with fibroadenoma (NBC) and 50 healthy women were enrolled.The level of hTERT in the plasma was significantly different in BC, NBC and controls (p0.01), showing a sensitivity of 50% and specificity of 90% in the ability to detect malignancy. The circulating hTERT DNA was significantly different in the estrogen receptor (ER)(+)/progesterone receptor (PgR)(+) compared to the ER(-)/PgR(-) patients (p=0.03). Higher hTERT levels were associated with higher human epidermal growth factor receptor (HER)-2/Neu expression: score 0-1 vs. score 2+ (p=0.01) and vs. score 3+ (p=0.02). Finally, hTERT was significantly inversely correlated with the carbohydrate antigen (CA) 15.3 serum level (p=0.001).Circulating hTERT DNA has a better diagnostic value than CA 15.3 in early breast cancer disease and could be a possible candidate as a tumor marker in patients with infiltrating ductal carcinoma positive to steroid hormonal receptor and with amplification of HER-2/Neu.

Summary Cellular iron uptake is mediated by binding of transferrin with specific surface receptors and internalization of the Fe-transferrin-receptor complex. This has been examined as a possible pathway for carrying into leukaemic cells a ribosome-inactivating protein (RIP), SO-6, derived from Saponaria officinalis. Purified human differic transferrin was conjugated with SO-6 and a pool of proteins was obtained, with variable numbers of SO-6 molecules linked to a single transferrin molecule. Human erythroleukaemic K562 cells were grown in the presence of human transferrin, SO-6 and human transferrin conjugated with SO-6. The conjugate was found to be internalized via binding with transferrin receptor. Whereas the presence of unconjugated human transferrin and SO-6 in the medium did not significantly influence K562 cell growth, the conjugated proteins displayed an inhibitory activity on cell proliferation. This was maximal after 72 h at a transferrin concentration of 10-9m, with about 50% of cells being killed. Bovine transferrin, present in fetal calf serum, did not appear to compete with human diferric transferrin in binding to K562 cells in suspension culture. In a clonogenic assay, colony formation by leukaemic cells was not influenced by free SO-6 or transferrin, whereas the conjugated proteins were markedly inhibitory (about 100% at 10-9m). Our findings indicate that SO-6 can be efficiently carried into mammalian cells via the transferrin-transferrin receptor cycle and exert its ribosome inactivating activity. This is in keeping with the existence of an alternative pathway of transferrin endocytosis in addition to the classic acidic endosome pathway. From a practical viewpoint, conjugates between transferrin and SO-6 can be useful tools for studying the expression of transferrin receptors, and deserve also to be investigated for a possible use in cancer therapy.