Women carrying two copies of a variant of p53 gene are seven times more likely to develop cervical cancer uterine patients with one copy. The discovery, published in today's issue of Nature , helps explain the link between the disease and the human papilloma virus (HPV), a common infection of the genital tract in women.
"The importance of this study is that it suggests another risk factor" for cervical cancer, said Kathleen Cho, a gynecological pathologist at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. " this makes sense in the context of what we understand how HPV contributes to cervical cancer. "Cho said the findings could lead to the development of a genetic test that would identify those at high risk of cervical cancer.
cervical cancer kills more women worldwide than any cancer except breast cancer. for over 20 years, researchers have known that millions of women whose number genital tract is infected by certain types of HPV, a few thousand will develop cervical cancer. HPVs produce proteins that inactivate the cellular tumor suppressor proteins. one of these HPV proteins, called E6 inactivate p53 protein, which is as an emergency brake to stop cells that have suffered genetic damage in the division.
In the late 1980s, researchers discovered that the p53 gene that had two different alleles. We used the amino acid arginine, while the other proline used. A team led by Alan Storey of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in London wondered if the appearance of these forms could affect the susceptibility of an individual to cancer of the cervix.
In test tube experiments, the researchers studied the effect of the HPV E6 protein of the 18 human cells that express the type of p53 protein. They found that although HPV-18 p53 arginine destroyed, it left intact p53 proline. The researchers then compared the frequency of the two alleles in the tumor cells and control and found that a person carries two copies of the form of arginine p53 gene is seven times more susceptible to induced cancer HPV-than those that are not.
0 Komentar