title: Molecular pathology of early pancreatic cancer.
abstract: We describe the pathology of early pancreatic cancer and present an overview of known molecular alterations that occur in these lesions. There are three defined precursor lesions in current models of pancreatic cancer: pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PanIN), mucinous cystic neoplasms (MCN), and intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasms (IPMN). Molecular alterations detected in these lesions include: telomeres, K-ras and downstream targets, p16/CDKN2A, p53, SMAD4/DPC4, microRNAs, mucins and their post-translational processing, inflammatory cytokines, CEACAM, and epigenetic alterations. We summarize previous analyses of these markers as diagnostic markers of disease, and suggest areas of future study.
authors: Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA.
authors: Neeley
authors: N
authors: Remmers
authors: Jennifer M
authors: JM
authors: Bailey
authors: Ashley M
authors: AM
authors: Mohr
authors: Michael A
authors: MA
authors: Hollingsworth
mesh_terms: D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D000818:Animals; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000378:metabolism; D002471:Cell Transformation, Neoplastic / Q000378:metabolism; D018450:Disease Progression; D055088:Early Detection of Cancer; D006801:Humans; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D010190:Pancreatic Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D011230:Precancerous Conditions / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D035683:MicroRNAs