title: Telomerase activity of basal cell carcinoma in patients living in North Queensland, Australia.
abstract: Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common skin cancer in North Queensland, Australia. The role of telomerase in BCC has not been investigated in this region. The objective of the study was to investigate the expression levels of human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) and telomerase activity in nodular BCCs and superficial BCCs from patients living in North Queensland. Matched tumor and adjacent nontumorous mucosa samples from 12 BCCs (7 nodular and 5 superficial) among 11 male patients were collected. In these samples, RNA was extracted and then transcribed to complementary DNA. Real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was used to quantify the expression levels of hTERT messenger RNA (mRNA). In addition, telomeric repeat amplification protocol assay, a PCR-based method, was performed to detect telomerase activity in tissue extracts from these samples. The findings were correlated with the clinicopathologic features of patients with these tumors. All BCC samples expressed telomerase hTERT mRNA, and 75% (9/12) of the BCC samples showed telomerase activity. The mean level of expression among BCC samples was higher than that among matched nontumor samples (mean, 0.468 versus 0.140; P < .0001). Nodular BCC samples showed higher expression levels of hTERT mRNA as compared with superficial BCC samples (mean, 0.584 versus 0.305; P < .05). There was no significant association between expression of hTERT mRNA and tumor size. In conclusion, this study is the first on telomerase expression in BCC in Queensland as well as the first to analyze telomerase in BCC by quantitative PCR. The results indicate that telomerase alterations have an important role in the pathogenesis of BCCs. A unique finding is that the telomerase expression level in nodular BCCs is different from that in superficial BCCs.
authors: Schools of Medicine and Public Health and North Queensland Center for Cancer Research (Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine), James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland Q4811, Australia.
authors: Said
authors: S
authors: Saleh
authors: School of Medicine, Griffith University, Gold Coast, Queensland Q4215, Australia. Electronic address: a.lam@griffith.edu.au.
authors: Alfred King-Yin
authors: AK
authors: Lam
authors: Schools of Medicine and Public Health and North Queensland Center for Cancer Research (Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine), James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland Q4811, Australia.
authors: Petra
authors: P
authors: Gertraud Buettner
authors: Schools of Medicine and Public Health and North Queensland Center for Cancer Research (Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine), James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland Q4811, Australia.
authors: Margaret
authors: M
authors: Glasby
authors: Schools of Medicine and Public Health and North Queensland Center for Cancer Research (Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine), James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland Q4811, Australia.
authors: Beverly
authors: B
authors: Raasch
authors: Schools of Medicine and Public Health and North Queensland Center for Cancer Research (Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine), James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland Q4811, Australia.
authors: Yik-Hong
authors: YH
authors: Ho
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D002280:Basal Cell Carcinoma / Q000201:enzymology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010865:Pilot Projects; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D011793:Queensland; D012878:Skin Neoplasms / Q000201:enzymology*; D019098:Telomerase / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: C509186:TERT protein, human; D019098:Telomerase