Published in:
01-09-2009 | Original Paper
Overexpression of Caveolin-1 in Hepatocellular Carcinoma with Metastasis and Worse Prognosis: Correlation with Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor, Microvessel Density and Unpaired Artery
Authors:
Zhi-Bo Zhang, Lei Cai, Shu-Guo Zheng, Yan Xiong, Jia-Hong Dong
Published in:
Pathology & Oncology Research
|
Issue 3/2009
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Abstract
Caveolin-1 is the major structural protein in caveolae, implicated in oncogenesis and angiogenesis. The connections between caveolin-1 and progression and angiogenesis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is still not clear. Thus we investigated the relationship of caveolin-1 expression, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) expression, microvessel density (MVD), and unpaired artery (UA) with the clinicopathologic features of patients with HCC. Formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue sections of HCC from 75 patients who had undergone an initial hepatectomy were stained immunohistochemically with specific antibodies against caveolin-1, VEGF, CD34 and α-SMA. The levels of caveolin-1, VEGF, MVD and UA were correlated with the clinicopathologic variables, and tissue sections were also analyzed by dual-label immunofluorescence. We found that increased expression of caveolin-1 was associated with metastasis and with a worse prognosis of HCC. Caveolin-1 expression correlates positively with VEGF, MVD and UA. These results suggest that caveolin-1 may play an important role in the progression of HCC and angiogenesis.