Increased expression of ARF GTPases in prostate cancer tissue

Claire Morgan; Paul D Lewis; Lynda Hopkins; Stephanie Burnell; Howard Kynaston; Shareen H Doak

doi:10.1186/s40064-015-1136-y

Increased expression of ARF GTPases in prostate cancer tissue

Springerplus. 2015 Jul 12:4:342. doi: 10.1186/s40064-015-1136-y. eCollection 2015.

Authors

Claire Morgan¹, Paul D Lewis², Lynda Hopkins³, Stephanie Burnell¹, Howard Kynaston⁴, Shareen H Doak¹

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Life Science, Swansea University, Swansea, UK.
² Respiratory Diagnostics group, Institute of Life Science 2, Swansea University, Swansea, UK.
³ Pathology Department, Singleton Hospital, Swansea, UK.
⁴ Department of Surgery, Cardiff School of Medicine, Heath Park, Cardiff, UK.

Abstract

Purpose: ARFs are a family of Ras-related GTP binding proteins, ARF6, in particular, is implicated in cancer invasion and metastasis. However, the role of ARF proteins in prostate cancer have yet to be investigated.

Methods: Immunohistochemical staining for ARF6 was performed on a prostate cancer tissue microarray with patient matched normal specimens.

Results: Antibody staining was significantly over-expressed in prostate cancer patient samples compared to normal patient tissue and a trend towards increased staining intensity in cancer samples with Gleason scores of 8 and above (metastatic disease).

Conclusion: Due to high homology between members of the ARF family we could not determine if ARF 6 was the only ARF over-expressed in the prostate cancer samples. However, we are the first to show that ARF-GTPases are over expressed in prostate cancer which provides further insight into the molecular biology of prostate cancer.

Keywords: ARF GTPases; Aggressive disease; Immunohistochemistry; Prostate cancer.