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Decreased expression of Beclin-1 and LC3 in human lung cancer

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Abstract

Autophagy, a conversed response to stress, has recently been studied in human cancers. Two important autophagic genes—Beclin-1 and LC3 are reported in several human cancers. However, the expressions of Beclin-1 and LC3 in lung cancer have not yet been investigated. In the present study, we investigated the expression of Beclin-1 and LC3, and the relationship between the expression profile and the clinical or pathological changes in human lung cancer. 40 primary lung cancer patients are involved in present study. mRNA expressions of Beclin-1 and LC3-II were detected by Real Time PCR and the protein levels were assessed by immunohistochemistry and western blot. Relative lower expressions of Beclin-1 and LC3-II mRNA were found in the lung cancer tissues compared to counterpart normal tissues. Consistently, the lower amount of Beclin-1 and LC3-II protein was found in lung cancer tissues. However, the expressions of Beclin-1 and LC3-II in lung cancer tissues were not affected by patients’ age, gender, smoking, histological type, lymph node metastasis and tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage. Both mRNA and protein levels of Beclin-1 and LC3-II were significantly decreased in lung cancer tissues which suggested that autophagy may be involved in the pathogenesis of lung cancer.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Prof. Jiang-Ning Zhou from University of Science and Technology of China for support. The present study was supported by Nature Science Foundation of China (30670936).

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The authors have no conflicts of the interest to disclose.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pulmonary, Anhui Geriatric Institute, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China

    Zi-Feng Jiang, Li-Jie Shao, Wei-Min Wang, Xue-Bo Yan & Rong-Yu Liu

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  1. Zi-Feng Jiang
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  2. Li-Jie Shao
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Correspondence to Rong-Yu Liu.

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Jiang, ZF., Shao, LJ., Wang, WM. et al. Decreased expression of Beclin-1 and LC3 in human lung cancer. Mol Biol Rep 39, 259–267 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-011-0734-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-011-0734-1

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