The Open Endocrinology Journal

2008, 2 : 16-20
Published online 2008 December 17. DOI: 10.2174/1874216500802010016
Publisher ID: TOEJ-2-16

Relationship Between RKIP Protein Expression and Clinical Staging in Thyroid Carcinoma

Bogusz Trojanowicz , Ting Fu , Oliver Gimm , Carsten Sekulla , Rainer Finke , Henning Dralle and Cuong Hoang-Vu
AG Experimentelle & Chirurgische Onkologie, Universitätsklinik und Poliklinik für Allgemein-, Viszeral- und Gefäßchirurgie, Magdeburger Str. 18, D-06097 Halle/S., Germany.

ABSTRACT

Raf-1 Kinase Inhibitory Protein (RKIP) belongs to a new class modulators of signalling cascades involved in maintaining of biological balance in many living organisms.

RKIP targets and inhibits different kinases (Mitogen Activated Protein (MAP) kinase, G- protein coupled receptor (GPCR) kinase and nuclear factor kappa B (NF-􀀂B) signaling pathways), and its loss is associated with progression of many solid cancers and development of metastasis. In this study we analyzed RKIP expression in follicular, papillary and undifferentiated thyroid carcinoma tissues from 54 patients by western blotting.

We found that significantly reduced or lost RKIP expression was associated with lymph node (30 of 39 N1 tumors, 76.9%) and distant metastases (17 of 20 M1 tumors, 85%). No significant correlations were observed between RKIP expression and T-category, age, gender, histological type or tumor differentiation grade. Our results indicate that reduction of RKIP expression is a highly predictive factor for lymph node and distant metastasis in patients with thyroid carcinoma.

Keywords:

RKIP, PEBP, thyroid carcinoma.