Unclassified mucin phenotype of gastric adenocarcinoma exhibits the highest invasiveness.
OBJECTIVE
Gastric cancers present with distinctive carcinogenesis pathways that vary with the mucin phenotypes. We attempted to elucidate the relations between the characteristics of the mucin phenotypes of gastric cancer and the tumor invasiveness.


METHODS
Gastric adenocarcinomas that were resected surgically between August 2005 and April 2007 were included in the present study. The gastric cancers were subclassified into gastric and intestinal mucin phenotypes if more than 10% of cancer cells exhibited gastric (MUC5AC and/or MUC6) and intestinal (MUC2 or CD10) markers, respectively.


RESULTS
The mucin phenotypes of 123 gastric cancers were gastric (n = 31), intestinal (n = 43), mixed (n = 28) and unclassified (n = 21). The mucin phenotype was related to histological type (P < 0.001), Lauren's classification (P = 0.001) and size (P = 0.014) of the gastric adenocarcinoma, but not to its location or to the presence of Helicobacter pylori infection. The unclassified mucin phenotype exhibited the largest number of lymph node metastases (P = 0.007), lymphatic invasions (P < 0.001) and neural invasions (P = 0.026), whereas the intestinal mucin phenotype exhibited the lowest invasiveness.


CONCLUSIONS
The mucin phenotype reflects the biological behavior of gastric cancer, with the intestinal and unclassified mucin phenotypes exhibiting the lowest and highest invasiveness, respectively.
Han
Hye S
HS
Department of Pathology, Konkuk University School of Medicine, Seoul 143-729, Korea.
Lee
Sun-Young
SY
Lee
Kyung Y
KY
Hong
Sung N
SN
Kim
Jeong H
JH
Sung
In-Kyung
IK
Park
Hyung S
HS
Jin
Choon J
CJ
Min
Young I
YI
D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics / Q000382:microbiology / Q000473:pathology; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002454:Cell Differentiation; D005260:Female; D015972:Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic; D016480:Helicobacter pylori / Q000302:isolation & purification; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D008207:Lymphatic Metastasis; D008297:Male; D053842:Microsatellite Instability; D008875:Middle Aged; D055271:Mucin 5AC / Q000032:analysis; D055262:Mucin-2 / Q000032:analysis; D055272:Mucin-6 / Q000032:analysis; D009077:Mucins / Q000032:analysis*; D009361:Neoplasm Invasiveness; D015260:Neprilysin / Q000032:analysis; D010641:Phenotype; D013274:Stomach Neoplasms / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics / Q000382:microbiology / Q000473:pathology
C524625:MUC2 protein, human; C524678:MUC5AC protein, human; C524734:MUC6 protein, human; D055271:Mucin 5AC; D055262:Mucin-2; D055272:Mucin-6; D009077:Mucins; D015260:Neprilysin