Thus we have provided evidence that may identify the MUC1 A/G polymorphism at 568 site, as a potential genetic factor which leads to an increase in susceptibility for GC through alteration of MUC1 gene and MUC1 expression in the population that carry the A allele.
These findings indicate that MUC1 CT plays a role in the intracellular signaling through its interaction with beta-catenin and upregulate the Wnt target gene cyclinD1 in CagA H. pylori-infected gastric carcinoma.
Both CEA and MUC1 mRNA expression was correlated significantly with all malignant biological properties of GC, such as macroscopic type, depth of tumor invasion, lymph-node metastasis, TNM stage and coexisting distant metastasis (all p < 0.05).
To clarify the clinical significance of TSG expression in gastric carcinoma, the expression of various TSG candidates (p53, E-cadherin, FHIT, smad4, rb, VHL, PTEN, MGMT, p16, and KAI1), as well as other proteins (bcl-2, MUC1, MUC2, MUC5AC, MUC6, CEA, CD44, beta-catenin, C-erbB2, and cyclin B2), was evaluated immunohistochemically in 329 consecutive gastric carcinomas using the tissue array method.
These findings show that MUC1 polymorphism may define different susceptibility backgrounds for the development of conditions that precede gastric carcinoma: chronic atrophic gastritis (CAG) and intestinal metaplasia (IM).
This finding raised the possibility that the very high prevalence of gastric carcinoma in Portugal could be partly due to a high frequency of small MUC1 alleles in the Portuguese population.
The aims of this work were to describe the MUC6 gene polymorphism in the Portuguese population and to evaluate whether MUC6 gene polymorphism was involved in individual susceptibility to gastric cancer development, as observed previously for the MUC1 gene.