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Do pentraxin 3 and neural pentraxin 2 have different facet function in hepatocellular carcinoma?

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Abstract

The long pentraxin (PTX) 3 and the neuronal pentraxin (NPTX) 2 has been found to exert pleiotropic roles in cancers due to their action in inflammation. However, the accurate clinical significance of PTX3 and NPTX2 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), one of the commonest cancers in the world has not been well-defined. The aim of the study was to analyze the expression profile of PTX3 and NPTX2 in liver biopsies of HCV-positive HCC patients (liver recipients, LR, n = 14, age 59.4 ± 1.8 years) undergoing liver transplantation and in donors (LD, n = 14, age 62.1 ± 17.3 years), trying both to identify them as predictive biomarkers of clinical liver severity in HCC patients and to understand if they were mutually substitutable. The PTX3 and NPTX2 transcripts were significantly up regulated in HCC tissues (p = 0.004 and p = 0.02 LD vs. LR, respectively). Dividing patients following MELD score, PTX3 expression increased as a function of liver disease severity, while this trend was not observed for NPTX2, which mRNA level increased similarly in both MELD group, reaching the significance only in patients with MELD score < 9 (p = 0.01). A positive correlation was found between PTX3 and NPTX2 expression (p = 0.001; r = 0.69). This is the first study that concerns PTX3 and NPTX2 as a function of clinical severity from which emerged that both of them are unequivocally involved in HCC, but only PTX3 could be considered a staging marker in these HCV-related HCC patients, unlike NPTX2, which could only play a role as an inflammatory marker.

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Funding

This work was supported by “INTEROMICS FLAGSHIP PROJECT” (Metabolomics identification of prognostic and diagnostic biomarkers of hepatocellular carcinoma), supported by the MUR (Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research) and coordinated by the CNR (National Research Council).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Clinical Physiology, National Research Council CNR, Via Giuseppe Moruzzi 1, 56124, Pisa, Italy

    Manuela Cabiati, Melania Gaggini & Silvia Del Ry

  2. Hepatobiliary Surgery and Liver Transplantation, University of Pisa Medical School Hospital, Pisa, Italy

    Paolo De Simone

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  1. Manuela Cabiati
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  2. Melania Gaggini
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  3. Paolo De Simone
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  4. Silvia Del Ry
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis were done by Manuela Cabiati, Silvia Del Ry. Methodology was done by Silvia Del Ry, Manuela Cabiati and Melania Gaggini. Patient enrolment was done by Paolo De Simone. Writing—original draft was done by Manuela Cabiati and Silvia Del Ry. Writing—review & editing was done by Silvia Del Ry and Melania Gaggini. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Manuela Cabiati.

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The study was carried out in compliance with the principles set forth in the 2008 Seoul revision of the declaration of Helsinki. All protocols of this study were approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee, according to the Code of Ethics of the World Medical Association (declaration of Helsinki) for experiments involving human subjects. All patients enrolled gave their consent to be included in the study.

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Cabiati, M., Gaggini, M., De Simone, P. et al. Do pentraxin 3 and neural pentraxin 2 have different facet function in hepatocellular carcinoma?. Clin Exp Med 21, 555–562 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10238-021-00714-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10238-021-00714-y

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