Vahideh Mirnia - Department of Biology, Islamic Azad University, Babol, Iran
Reza Tabaripour - Department of Biology, Islamic Azad University, Babol, Iran
Novin Nikbakhsh - Department of Genetics, Faculty of Medicine, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Iran
Elham Ghadami - Department of Genetics, Faculty of Medicine, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Iran

Introduction: Hedgehog signaling pathway is an important direction in human gastric cancer. SUFU (supper of Fused) is one of the main genes implicated in this pathway, and acts a negative regulator which interacts directly with the GLI family transcription factors. The aim of the present study was to assess SUFU expression levels in patients affected with gastric cancer. Materials and Methods: Fresh frozen samples from ten patient’s tumor and their non-tumoral borders were studied. All patients have undergone surgery in Babol Clinic hospital of Babol between 1394-1395. Total RNA was extracted using Tripure and cDNA was synthesized from total RNA using with specific primers. SUFU mRNA expression was compared to the expression of GAPDH as a house keeping gene by Real-Time PCR.Results: Down regulation of SUFU was observed in tumoral tissues.Discussion: These findings suggest that decreased SUFU expression is more frequently in gastric cancer. Therefore, variation in SUFU expression may play a role in gastric cancer development. Further investigation on this gene may provide a new target for therapeutic strategies.

Gastric cancer, SUFU, tumor suppressor, real-time PCR