Cellular differentiation and histogenesis of rat glandular stomach cancers

The gastric and intestinal phenotypic expressions of tumor cells in 18 adenomatous hyperplasias, 33 well-differentiated adenocarcinomas, and 16 undifferentiated adenocarcinomas (4 poorly differentiated adenocarcinomas, 10 signet-ring cell carcinomas and 2 mucinous adenocarcinomas) induced by N-methyl-N'-nitro-N-nitrosoguanidine or 4-nitroquinoline-1-oxide in the rat glandular stomach were studied by histochemical stainings for mucin and immunohistochemical staining for pepsinogen isozyme 1 (Pg 1). By histochemical staining for mucin [by the paradoxical concanavalin A method, the modified method with labeled peanut lectin, the galactose oxidase-Schiff (GOS) reaction, and the sialidase-GOS reaction] and immunohistochemical staining of Pg 1, gastric cancer cells of each histological group could be clearly classified into a gastric type, including mucous neck cell pyloric gland cell, and surface mucous cell subtypes, and an intestinal type, including goblet-cell, and intestinal absorptive cell subtypes. All tumors examined in this work consisted mainly of gastric-type cells but intestinal-type tumor cells were occasionally found among the gastric-type tumor cells. The incidences of intestinal-type cells in adenomatous hyperplasias (11.1%) and small well-differentiated adenocarcinomas (28.6%) were significantly less (P less than 0.05) than that in large well-differentiated adenocarcinomas (68.4%). The incidence of intestinal-type cells in small undifferentiated adenocarcinomas (25.0%) was also less than that in large ones (58.3%). The present results suggest the occurrence of change of phenotypic expression of tumor cells from the gastric type to the intestinal type during growth of tumors.