Expression and Clinic Value of HOXB13 in Prostate Cancer

  • Dr Yanmi Li, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China
  • Dr Jie Tang, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China
  • Dr Jingchun Yang, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China
  • Dr Xiang Fei, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China
  • Dr Shunxin Zhang, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China
  • Dr Li Xu, Department of Ultrasound, Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital, China

    • Background: PCa is a major cause of suffering in males. There have been attempts to identify genes that might be involved in prostatic development and carcinogenesis. HOXB13 is the last identified vertebrate HOX gene. This research was carried out to evaluate the expression of HOXB13 in PCa by real-time PCR, and investigate the correlation with clinical values.
    Methods: transrectal CEUS was carried out in twelve individuals who were demonstrated to be PCa by subsequent transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) biopsy. With the quantifying analysis software-Autotracking Contrast Quantification (ACQ), the arrival time (AT), time to peak intensity (TTP) and peak intensity (PI) of regions of prostate cancer were evaluated. TRUS-guided biopsies were performed in the region of cancer and non-cancer, respectively. With real-time quantitative PCR, the amplification curve and melting curve were obtained. The relationships between the expression of HOXB13 and the level of PSA, AT, TTP and PI were analyzed, respective.
    Results: The mean threshold cycle (Ct) of cancer tissue were (14.45± 0.94) and non-cancer tissue were (15.86 ± 0.67), P<0.05. There were statistically correlations between expression of HOXB13 and tPSA (r=0.591, P<0.05). But there were no statistically correlations between expression of HOXB13 and fPSA (P=0.135), or and fPSA/tPAS (P=0.123). In prostate cancer tissue, there were statistically significant correlations between Ct and AT (r=0.652, P<0.05), no correlation between Ct and TTP (P=0.210) or PI (P=0.053).
    Conclusions: HOXB13 was more abundant in the prostate cancer tissue than prostate non-cancer tissue and the expression was correlated with tPSA, AT. Key words: Prostate; Cancer; HOXB13; transrectal contrast-enhanced ultrasonography.