Journal
FOLIA HISTOCHEMICA ET CYTOBIOLOGICA
Volume 59, Issue 2, Pages 86-94Publisher
VIA MEDICA
DOI: 10.5603/FHC.a2021.0009
Keywords
ghrelin; immunohistochemistry; adrenal tumors; adrenal cortex; adrenal medulla
Categories
Funding
- Opus Grant program of the National Science Center [UMO-2017/25/B//NZ4/00065]
- Social Health Insurance Project, Republic of Kazakhstan [SHIP-2.3/CS-02]
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This study compared the protein-level expression of ghrelin in various adrenal tumors, suggesting that the expression profile of ghrelin may be associated with the type of adrenal tumor, and that it may serve as a sensitive and specific marker for distinguishing between different types of adrenal tumors.
Introduction. Ghrelin, originally isolated from the endocrine cells of the gastric mucosa, is also expressed in many peripheral tissues, including normal adrenals and adrenocortical tumors. It was shown that ghrelin stimulates proliferation and inhibits apoptosis of adrenocortical cells. In the current study, we compared ghrelin expression at the protein level in various adrenal tumors. We analyzed whether immunoreactive ghrelin could be considered as a potential marker for different types of adrenal tumors. Material and methods. Study was carried out on 200 adrenal specimens arranged on microscope slide in tissue microarray format. We performed standardized immunohistochemical reactions with semiquantitative reaction intensity measurements. Results. At the protein level, the expression of ghrelin was significantly reduced in adrenocortical adenocarcinoma in relation to the control group and pheochromocytoma as well as cancer-adjacent normal adrenal tissue. In contrast, a relatively high ghrelin expression was found in pheochromocytoma compared to all analyzed groups, with the exception of cancer-adjacent normal adrenal tissue. Conclusions. The ghrelin expression profile at the protein level may be associated with the type of adrenal tumor. In this context, our results suggest that adrenal immunoreactive ghrelin may be considered as a sensitive and specific marker for differentiating adrenocortical carcinoma from adrenocortical adenoma and pheochromocytoma.
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