title: Epigenetic alterations of the SERPINE1 gene in oral squamous cell carcinomas and normal oral mucosa.
abstract: A high level of plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1 or SERPINE1) in tumor extracts is a marker of a poor prognosis in human cancers, including oral carcinomas. However, the mechanisms responsible for the upregulation of PAI-1 in cancers remain unclear. Investigating specific PAI-1 expressing cells in oral carcinomas by immunohistochemistry, we found that PAI-1 was expressed in 18 of the 20 patients, mainly by cancer cells. Two showed PAI-1 positive stromal cells surrounding the tumor areas and five showed PAI-1 positive cells in tumor-adjacent normal epithelium. By real-time RT-PCR analysis, 17 of 20 patients with oral carcinoma were found to have between 2.5- and 50-fold increased tumor PAI-1 mRNA level, as compared with the matched tumor-adjacent normal tissues. The PAI-1 mRNA level in connective tissues from 15 healthy volunteers was similar to the level in tumor-adjacent normal tissues, but the level in epithelium was 5- to 10-fold lower. Analyzing DNA methylation of 25 CpG sites within 960 bp around the transcription initiation site of the SERPINE1 gene by bisulfite sequencing, we did the surprising observation that both tumors and tumor-adjacent normal tissue had a significant level of methylation, whereas there was very little methylation in tissue from healthy volunteers, suggesting that tumor-adjacent normal tissue already contains transformation-associated epigenetic changes. However, there was no general inverse correlation between PAI-1 mRNA levels and SERPINE1 gene methylation in all tissues, showing that CpG methylation is not the main determinant of the PAI-1 expression level in oral tissue.
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology, Danish-Chinese Centre for Proteases and Cancer, University of Aarhus, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark. shg@mb.au.dk
authors.forename: Shan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Boye Schnack
authors.initials: BS
authors.lastname: Nielsen
authors.forename: Annelise
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Krogdahl
authors.forename: Jens Ahm
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Sørensen
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tagesen
authors.forename: Sally
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Dabelsteen
authors.forename: Erik
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Dabelsteen
authors.forename: Peter A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Andreasen
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000235:genetics*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D019175:DNA Methylation; D044127:Epigenesis, Genetic; D005260:Female; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009061:Mouth Mucosa / Q000502:physiology; D009062:Mouth Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics*; D017395:Plasminogen Activator Inhibitor 1 / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D017395:Plasminogen Activator Inhibitor 1; C051321:SERPINE1 protein, human