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Ann Thorac Surg 2001;71:954-955
© 2001 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons

Invited commentary

^a Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Southern Illinois University, School of Medicine, 800 N Rutledge, Room D314, Springfield, IL 62781, USA

e-mail: shazelrigg{at}siumed.edu

This article by Dr Liu and colleagues addresses a very interesting area of study. Adhesion molecules are cell surface glycoproteins which anchor cells together. There are four classes of adhesion molecules of which the cadherins are considered the most important. Studies on a variety of carcinomas have suggested that decreased expression of these cadherin molecules correlates with an increased rate of metastasis and decreased survival. The postulate is that low expression of adhesion molecules plays a role in cell to cell detachment, resulting in metastasis. This also results in a loss of negative feedback control and increased cellular proliferation, ie, tumor growth.

Most of the work implicating a role for cadherins in malignancy has focused upon E-cadherin, as does this manuscript. There is experimental evidence that when a normal E-cadherin gene is transfected into invasive tumor cells these cells lose their invasiveness [1]. Conversely, using anti-E-cadherin antibodies can induce invasive behavior [2,3]. Hence the implications for the cadherin molecules are potentially great and it is possible that the degree of their expression can affect prognosis.

This study retrospectively adds to the already present information that reduced E-cadherin is correlated with the degree of tumor differentiation, lymph node metastasis and prognosis. Liu and associates have found that tumor status and nodal status are superior prognostic factors, hence the real potential role for this information is in early staged patients for consideration of chemotherapy. E-cadherin expression was a significant predictor of survival in multivariant analysis in this study. We can thus infer that in node negative patients a finding of reduced E-cadherin expression in this study (38% of node negative patients) places that patient on a lower survival curve.

For the most part, the information presented in this manuscript is not new but does add to an already existing body of evidence that adhesion molecules play an important role in malignancy. Further study, as always, will be required in this exciting area of research. The authors are to be congratulated for this timely work.

References

1. Behrens J., Mareel M.M., Van Roy F.M., et al. Dissecting tumor cell invasion: epithelial cells acquire invasive properties after the loss of unomorulin-mediated cell-cell adhesion. J Cell Biol 1989;108:2435-2447.[Abstract/Free Full Text]
2. Umbas R., Schalken J.A., Aalders T.W., et al. Expression of the cellular adhesion molecule E-cadherin is reduced or absent in high grade prostate cancer. Cancer Res 1992;51:5104-5109.
3. Vleminckx K., Vakaet L., Mareel M., et al. Genetic manipulation of E-cadherin expression by epithelial tumor cells reveals an invasion suppressor role. Cell 1991;66:107-119.[Medline]

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Personal Folders Download to citation manager Author home page(s): Stephen R. Hazelrigg Permission Requests Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Hazelrigg, S. R. Search for Related Content PubMed Articles by Hazelrigg, S. R. Related Collections Molecular biology