Nup88 expression is associated with myometrial invasion in endometrial carcinoma

The nuclear pore complex protein Nup88 has been shown in previous studies to be overexpressed in tumor cells and to be associated in breast cancer with all clinical and biological features defining a more aggressive phenotype.

In this pilot study, Nup88-mRNA expression was studied in a series of 29 endometrial carcinomas, of which 27 belonged to the endometrioid variety, the remaining 2 being papillary serous tumors, to verify if Nup88 plays a similar role in endometrial carcinoma as the one described in breast cancer. The tumor samples were obtained directly at the operating suite and fresh frozen at the time of hysterectomy. Nup88-mRNA expression was studied in them by means of differential reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction. Nup88-mRNA expression was correlated with the clinical features of the tumors.

A significant correlation (r = 0.41, P = 0.027) was found between growing levels of Nup88-mRNA expression and depth of myometrial invasion. There was no correlation between Nup88-mRNA expression and the other 2 available clinical parameters, that is, tumor grade (r = 0.05, P = 0.79) and surgical stage (r = -0.18, P = 0.34).

From these results, it is concluded that Nup88 expression seems indeed to be associated with a distinct feature of tumor aggressiveness (myometrial invasion) in endometrial carcinoma and that larger studies are therefore probably worthwhile.