Expression of endogenous lectins (galectins, receptors for ABH-epitopes) and the MIB-1 antigen in esophageal carcinomas and their syntactic structureanalysis in relation to post-surgical tumor stage and lymph node involvement

Squamous cell carcinomas of the esophagus, a disease with poor prognosis, a le especially frequent in China and South Africa. To initiate the study of endogenous lectins in this tumor class we employed synthetic neoglycoconjug ates and focused on galectins as markers. Histological sections of 43 cases of esophageal carcinomas were analyzed with labeled galectins-1 and -3 and their specific antibodies, neoglycoconjugates exposing chemically prepared histo-blood group A-, B- and H-trisaccharides and the antibody MIB-1 (Ki-6 7). Features of structural and numerical staining intensities determined qu antitatively were correlated to clinical data sets of pTN stages, sex and a ge of patients. Low tumor stages (pT1/T2) were seen in 10/43 cases (23%) an d 65% of the carcinomas surgically treated lacked notable lymph node involv ement (pN0). The women were younger than the men (47 years versus 54 years) . The proliferation activity of the tumor cells was high and amounted to 75 % at average: The presence of galectin-1 and the structural entropy of dist ribution of staining with carrier-immobilized A-trisaccharide were associat ed with pN stages. These initial data indicate that distinct glycohistochem ical features appeal to have prognostic significance in this tumor class, a dding to the emerging significance of this marker class in king cancer.