@article{3137650,
    title = "Expression of MAGE-A12 in oral squamous cell carcinoma",
    author = "Mollaoglu, Nur and Vairaktaris, Eleftherios and Nkenke, Emeka and and Neukam, Friedrich W. and Ries, Jutta",
    journal = "Disease Markers",
    year = "2008",
    volume = "24",
    number = "1",
    pages = "27-32",
    publisher = "HINDAWI LTD",
    issn = "0278-0240, 1875-8630",
    doi = "10.1155/2008/359840",
    keywords = "nested RT-PCR; MAGE-A12 gene expression; oral squamous cell carcinoma;
diagnostic; therapy",
    abstract = "Melanoma associated-A antigens (MAGE-A) are silent in normal tissues
except testis. However, they are activated in a variety of different
tumors. Thus, their expression is highly specific to cancer cells.
Reverse transcription-nested polymerase chain reaction (RT-nPCR) is a
highly sensitive technique that has been used successfully for the
detection of MAGE genes in tissue samples. The aim of the study is to
analyze the expression rate of MAGE-A12 in oral squamous cell carcinoma
(OSCC) using a high sensitive RT-nPCR. Total of 57 tissue samples
obtained from patients with OSCC and 20 normal oral mucosal (NOM) probes
of otherwise healthy volunteers were included to this study. No
expression of MAGE-A12 was observed in the non-neoplastic NOM tissues.
MAGE-A12 was expressed in 49.1% of the investigated tumor samples. The
correlation between malignant lesion and MAGE-A12 detection was
significant (p < 0.001). It is concluded that results of this study may
indicate MAGE-A12 as a useful additional diagnostic marker especially
for the early detection of OSCC distinguishing neoplastic transformation
and detection of occult and/or rare disseminated cancer cells. In
addition, MAGE-A12 expression in OSCC may also determine a new
immunotherapeutic target and might be warranted to develop vaccine for
OSCC."
}