Expression of Carbonic Anhydrase IX (CA9) in Human Tumor Tissue of Patients with Ovarian Cancer

Abstract

The aim of the present study is to determine the expression levels of the CAIX gene in the Paraffin-embedded tissue blocks from 43 patients with different stages of newly diagnosed ovarian cancer as well as 14 tissue samples of patients with benign ovarian tumors were used as a control group. The study performed using a reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). According to malignancy status the percentage of patients with CAIX-positive gene expression was significantly higher in compare with benign tumor patients. Depending on the cutoff value, the present study showed that 40(93.02%) of ovarian cancer samples were CAIX positive, which is statistically significant comparing with CAIX-negative samples 3(6.97%). Statistically there was no significant difference in the levels of gene expression with age, menopausal state, and family history. In correlation with histopathologic tumor types and tumor stage, the present study showed significant associations of high level of CAIX  gene expression with mucinous histopathologic tumor types(  p<0.05), and stage I of ovarian cancer ( p<0. 0.05). The present study concluded that the possibility of using CAIX gene as a useful tool for discriminating malignant ovarian tumors from non-malignant ones. We also demonstrated the diagnostic value of CAIX gene for early diagnosis of ovarian cancer.