[Expression of SLC25A38 in leukemic cells from children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia]

This study was aimed to investigate the SLC25A38 expression in pediatric patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and its clinical significance. A total of 23 newly diagnosed ALL pedictric patients were enrolled in test group, 10 pediatric patients with non-hematologic malignancies were selected as control group. The expression in protein and mRNA levels of SLC25A38 were detected by Western blot and real-time PCR respectively. The results showed that the SLC25A38 protein was positive in 8 of 23 pediatric ALL patients (34.78%), while no positive case was found in 10 controls. The relative expression level of SLC25A38 mRNA was 0.4673 ± 0.05344 in SLC25A38-protein positive group of ALL patients, while that was 1.296 ± 0.2517 in SLC25A38-protein negative group of ALL patients. The expression level of SLC25A38 mRNA in SLC25A38-protein positive group was significantly lower than that in negative group (P = 0.001) . No statistically significant difference was found in comparison of SLC25A38-protein negative group of ALL patients with the control group (P = 0.1097). The analysis of clinical data showed that there were significantly differences in sex, immunophenotype, initial peripheral white blood cell count and LDH between the SLC25A38-protein positive and SLC25A38-protein negative groups (P < 0.05). It is concluded that as a novel protein, SLC25A38 highly expressed in pediatric ALL patients, indicating that SLC25A38 may serve as a molecular marker and potential therapeutic target for acute lymphoblastic leukemia in children.