Astrocyte Elevated Gene 1 (AEG-1): The promising candidate for molecular targeted therapy in oral squamous cell carcinoma

introduction: Astrocyte Elevated Gene 1 (AEG-1) is also known as metadherin is an oncogene which is overexpressed in various types of cancers. Overexpression of AEG-1 plays an important role in invasion, metastasis, angiogenesis and chemotherapy resistance; hence can be used as a potential therapeutic target in treatment improvement and metastasis reduction. The aim of this study was to evaluate the expression of AEG-1 as a novel molecular marker in oral squamous cell carcinoma and its correlation with clinicopathologic factors.Methods: Thirty formalin fixed paraffin-embedded blocks of OSCC and 30 samples of normal oral mucosa were selected with minimal inflammation were staining by immunohistochemistry for AEG-1.The Staining intensity and percentage of stained cells were ranked according to nuclear and cytoplasmic staining of epithelial cells. Relationship between immunoreactivity and clinicopathologic factors were examined by T-Test and Mann-Whitney analysis.Results: There was AEG-1 overexpression in OSCC rather than normal oral mucosa(P<0.05). Nuclear and cytoplasmic expression of AEG-1 in OSCC was associated with none of the clinicopathologic factors such as age and gender of patients, tumor location, smoking, tumor staging grading of tumor, lymph node and distant metastasis.( P> 0.05)Conclusion: The current results support that AEG-1 plays role in progression of oral squamous cell carcinoma.

Keywords:

oral squamous cell carcinoma , metastasis , prognosis , AEG-1 , immunohistochemical staining