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ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Cancer/testis antigens are considered potential targets for immunotherapy due to their tumor-associated expression pattern. Although recent studies have demonstrated high expression of CT45 in classical Hodgkin's lymphomas (cHL), less is known about the expression pattern of other families of CTAs in cHL. We aim to evaluate the expression of MAGE-A family, MAGE-C1/CT7, MAGE-C2/CT10, NY-ESO1 and GAGE family in cHL and to correlate their expression with clinical and prognostic factors in cHL. METHODS: Tissue microarray was generated from 38 cHL archival cases from Pathology Department of Universidade Federal de Sao Paulo. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) was done using the following panel of antibodies: MAGE-A family (MA454, M3H67, 57B and 6C1), GAGE (#26), NY-ESO-1 (E978), MAGE-C1/CT7 (CT7-33) and MAGE-C2/CT10 (CT10#5). RESULTS: We found CTA expression in 21.1% of our cHL series. Among the tested CTAs, only MAGE-A family 7/38 (18.4%) and MAGE-C1/CT7 5/38 (13.2%) were positive in our cHL samples. We found higher CTA positivity in advanced stage (28.6%) compared to early stage (11.8%) disease, but this difference was not statistically significant. Analysis of other clinicopathological subgroups of cHL including histological subtypes, EBV status and response to treatment also did not demonstrate statistical significant differences in CTA expression. CONCLUSION: We found CTA expression in 21.1% of cHL samples using our panel. Our preliminary findings suggest that from all CTAs included in this study, MAGE-A family and MAGE-C1/CT7 are the most interesting ones to be explored in further studies.
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AIM: The present study aimed at correlating the expression of cancer/testis antigens (CTAs) with the expression of genes related to tumor-infiltrating T cells. MATERIALS & METHODS: MAGE-C1/CT-7, MAGEA3/6, NY-ESO-1, LAGE-1 and GAGE expression were evaluated in 46 bone marrow multiple myeloma (MM) aspirates by RT-PCR. Expression of FOXP3/CTLA4 and RORyt, as markers for Tregs and Th17 cells, respectively, was investigated by quantitative PCR. RESULTS: MAGEC1/CT7 was expressed in 66% of MM samples. We did not find correlation between the presence of single CTA and expression of CTLA4 or RORyt neither expression of CD4(+) T-cell markers and the number of CTA simultaneously expressed in the tumor. However, we did observe a correlation between the percentage of plasma cells and the number of CTAs expressed in the patients' bone marrow. CONCLUSION: Although CTAs and immunomodulatory CD4(+) T cells represent potential targets for immunotherapy in MM, we did not find association among expression of such genes in MM.