Protein Expression in Tissue of Ovarian Cancer Patients

描述（由申请人提供）： 我们从北方加州的上皮性卵巢癌患者中收集了流行病学数据和血液样本。在这些患者中，667人（94%）已允许获得石蜡包埋的卵巢组织样本。对于这项试点研究，我们要求资金收集这些组织样本，并分析它们的特定蛋白质表达模式，因为它们与患者及其肿瘤的特定特征有关。具体而言，该初步研究旨在：1）确定被认为在卵巢癌发病机制中可能重要的10种蛋白质的表达水平; 2）比较由患者特征、肿瘤组织病理学特征以及患者和组织病理学特征组合定义的亚组之间的表达水平。我们的长期目标（将在未来的资金下完成）是：i）研究目前蛋白质样本所代表的激素和细胞周期途径中涉及的许多其他蛋白质; ii）将蛋白质表达水平与卵巢癌生存率和与卵巢癌风险相关的生殖系多态性联系起来。检测患者和肿瘤特征之间的蛋白质表达变异应有助于开发和评估早期检测和新治疗策略的潜在筛选工具。这种检测也可能促进我们对卵巢癌发病机制的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): We have gathered epidemiological data and blood from a population-based sample of epithelial ovarian cancer patients in Northern California. Among these patients, 667 (94 percent) have provided permission to obtain samples of their paraffin-embedded ovarian tissue. For this pilot study, we request funds to collect these tissue samples and to analyze them for specific protein expression patterns, as they relate to particular characteristics of the patients and their tumors. Specifically, this pilot study aims to: 1) determine expression levels of 10 proteins considered to be potentially important in the pathogenesis of ovarian cancer; and 2) compare expression levels across subgroups defined by patient characteristics, histopathological characteristics of tumor, and combinations of patient and histopathological characteristics. Our long-term aims (to be accomplished under future funding) are to: i) study many additional proteins involved in the hormonal and cell-cycle pathways represented by the current sample of proteins; and ii) relate protein expression levels to ovarian cancer survival and to germline polymorphisms that are associated with ovarian cancer risk. Detection of protein expression variation across patient and tumor characteristics should help to develop and evaluate potential screening tools for early detection and new treatment strategies. Such detection also may advance our understanding of the pathogenesis of ovarian cancer.