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Clinicopathological Significance of the Integrin α5β1 Expression and Microvessel Density in Gastric Cancer

ObjectiveTo investigate the clinicopathological significance of integrin α5β1 expression and microvessel density(MVD) in gastric cancer(GC) and the correlation of MVD with integrin α5β1. MethodsThe expression of integrin α5β1 was detected by means of immunohistochemical staining (SP method) on paraffinembeded tissue specimens from 35 primary gastric carcinoma(PGC), 10 metastasic lymph node of gastric cancer and 8 chronic superficial gastritis (CSG). Vascular endothelial cells were stained immunohistochemically using antiCD34 monoclonal antibody to recognize microvessel(MV) in 35 cases of PGC and 8 CSG, MV was counted in 4 hot spot per slide under lightmicroscope (×400) and the average was defined as MVD. The results combined with clinicopathological parameters were analyzed statistically to characterize the role of integrin α5β1 and MVD in the progression of gastric cancer. ResultsIntegrin α5β1 expression and MVD in PGC were significantly higher than those in CSG respectively （t=3.32, P lt;0.01; t=2.30, Plt;0.05）; the expression of integrin α5β1 in PGC showed only a correlation with the invasion depth of tumor (t=2.29, Plt;0.05） while MVD showed all correlations with invasion depth,lymph node status and TNM stage （t=3.07, Plt;0.01; t=2.48, Plt;0.05; t=2.94,Plt;0.01）. Neither integrin α5β1expression nor MVD showed a relation with differential of PGC （t=0.15, Pgt;0.05; t=0.41, Pgt;0.05）. Integrin α5β1 was significantly overexpressed in lymph node metastatic cancer compared with that in corresponding PGC （t=2.45, Plt;0.05）; the difference of MVD showed no statistical significance among levels of integrin α5β1 expression in PGC （F =1.43,P＞0.05） and it showed no correlation with integrin α5β1 expression（r= 0.156, P=0.37）.Conclusion Overexpression of integrin α5β1 is present in GC and associates with the progression of tumor, implying that it may be viewed as the indicator of invasion and metastasis and the candidate target of gene therapy of gastric cancer. However, integrin α5β1 may not play an important role in the vascularization of GC.