The Expression Of Galectin-3, Smad4 In Gastric Cancer And Its Lymph Node And Their Significance

Gastric cancer is one of the most familiar malignant tumor among the digestive tumors, For all surgical operation cure for the patients having been diagnosed as early gastric cancer, the number of patients who could survive over 5 years is no more than half of the total. Lymphmetastases is the most main reason. Therefore, it is very important to detect micrometastasis of gastric cancer and its lymph nodes, which cannot be confirmed by traditional histology methods. The degree of lymph node micrometastasis of gastric cancer is one of the main factors which influence the predict prognosis of gastric cancer. It is easy to make out the T and M stage during the period of surgical operation, but it is difficult to judge the N stage. Once something is wrong, the number of the lymph nodes that should be got rid of will decrease. It is not too easy to diagnose the early gastric cancer by The method of the traditional histology, Our study is to find out the useful tumor marker for gastric carcinomas with respects to tumor metastasis or micrometastasis.The main function of Galectin-3 in the cell surface is related to tumor cell adhesion among the same kind cells, Galectin-3 is a protein composed of two distinct structural motifs, an amino-terminal half containing Gly-X-Y tandem repeats characteristic of collagens and a carboxyl-terminal half containing the carbohydrate-binding site~<3>.It is an important intracellular and extracellular structure that is presumed to interact with extracellular matrix proteins and cell surface glycoproteins in normal and pathophysiological conditions~<4>. Galectin-3 might be a useful tumor marker for gastric cancers with respects to tumor progression and potentiality of lymph node metastasis especially in certain histological types of gastric cancer~<5>.Smad4 was first identified as a tumor suppressor gene of pancreatic cancer, Smad4 plays a significant role in tumorigenesis and progression of pancreatic, colorectal, gastric, and other solid tumors. It performs a central role in transmitting signals from TGF-beta. Because the TGF-β-Smad signaling pathway has an important role in carcinogenesis, Smad4 plays an important role in carcinogenesis.AE1/ AE3 is Monoclonal antibody which can relate with several CK subtype, It can be used to mark the tumor of epithelial cell, especially identify and judge the metastasis tumor weather is epithelial cell. It has a good effect to judge the micrometastasis of lymph nodes of gastric cancer by AE1/AE3, it is recommended toprecisely determine the tumor stage, in order to direct cancer therapy and predict prognosis.Integrin P i is a sort of important ECM, the enhanced expression of Integrin 3 ] maybe predict the invasion tendency of gastric cancerous tissues, such as cell migration, differentiation, adhesion, pattern formation and apoptosis. It may be beneficial to estimate the metastasis degree of the gastric cancer by detecting the expression of Integrin ￡ i in gastric cancer tissues. It is useful to operation therapy and predict prognosis.In a word, the expression of Galectin-3, Smad4, AE1/ AE3 and Integrin P i in gastric cancer is different ,but all of them can be used to judge the Metastasis or micrometastasis of gastric cancer and its lymph nodes.