Journal des biomarqueurs moléculaires et du diagnostic

Immunoreaction of 14F7 Mab Raised against N-Glycolyl GM3 Ganglioside Correlates with High Histological Grade in some Tumors of Neuroectodermal and Epithelial Lineage

Abstract

Rancés Blanco, Damián Blanco, Xiomara Escobar, Charles E. Rengifo, Mercedes Cedeño1, Rosa Irene Alvarez, Enrique Rengifo and Adriana Carr

The aberrant expression of N-glycolyl GM3 ganglioside (NeuGcGM3) has been reported in a variety of malignant tumors. Nevertheless, the relationship between NeuGcGM3 expression and aggressive biological behavior still remains unclear for the majority of malignancies. In this article the tissue reactivity of the 14F7 monoclonal antibody, a highly specific IgG1 against NeuGcGM3, in breast cancer, urinary bladder tumors and malignant gliomas of adult patients is shown as well as its relation with the histological grade of these malignancies. The expression of NeuGcGM3 was detected in 92/155 (59.3%) of tumors independently of the histopathological classification. However, a preferential expression of NeuGcGM3 was detected in: infiltrating ductal carcinoma (77.1%) vs. infiltrating lobular carcinoma (15.9%) (p=0.024), grade III (94.9%) vs. grade II (77.8%) and grade I (63.8%) transitional cell carcinoma (p=0.042) and high-grade astrocytomas (78.6%) vs. low-grade astrocytic tumors (10.0%) (p=0.026). The results achieved suggest the relationship between the tissue expression of NeuGcGM3 and the more aggressive biological behavior of these malignancies, regardless of the tumor cell lineage. The data obtained also support the continuous use of NeuGcGM3 as a target for immunotherapy in malignancies expressing this molecule as well as that of 14F7 monoclonal antibody for the selection of candidate patients for these specific therapies.