STUDY ON THE ROLE OF WNT SIGNALLING PATHWAY IN OCCURRENCE AND DEVELOPMENT OF NON-SMALL CELL LUNG CANCER

Yujian Guo*, Meiwen An**, #, Xiao Zhang***

*Shanxi Medical Device Testing Center, Taiyuan, PR China - **College of Biomedical Engineering, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, PR China - ***First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, PR China

Objective: To explore the role of Wnt signalling pathway in the occurrence and development of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

Methods: Seventy cases of NSCLC surgical specimens in our hospital from June 2017 to September 2018 and 20 cases of normal tissue adjacent to cancer (5 m from the cutting edge of the tumour) were collected. The expression of Wnt-2, β-catenin and TCF-4 in lung cancer and paracancerous tissues was detected using an immunohistochemistry method. The relationship between β-catenin and median total survival time of NSCLC was analyzed with the Kaplan-Meier method. The expression of Wnt-2, β-catenin and TCF-4 in different clinicopathological features was compared.

Results: The positive expression rates of Wnt-2, β-catenin and TCF-4 in lung cancer tissues were 65.51%, 76.78% and 61.03%, respectively, and those in normal paracancerous tissues were 31.23%, 22.13% and 0%, respectively. The positive expression rate of Wnt-2, β-catenin and TCF-4 in lung cancer tissues was significantly higher than that in normal paracancerous tissues (P<0.05). The expression of Wnt-2, β-catenin in lung cancer tissues was substantially higher than that in normal paracancerous tissues, whereas TCF-4 was only expressed in lung cancer tissues. The positive expression rates of Wnt-2, β-catenin and TCF-4 in squamous cell carcinoma were 67.81%, 73.33% and 89.92%, respectively, and the positive expression rates in adenocarcinoma were 63.01%, 78.82% and 75.98%, respectively. There was no significant difference in the positive expression rate between squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma (P>0.05). β-catenin, TCF-4 was correlated with the degree of tissue differentiation (P<0.05), and β-catenin was also correlated with lymph node metastasis (P<0.05). Lung cancer was found in all 55 cases of Wnt+ tissues; 25 cases of lung cancer and 10 cases of paracancerous tissue were found in 35 cases of Wnt- tissues. There was a significant difference between the two groups (P<0.01). The mean survival time of patients with positive expression of β-catenin was 28.743±2.697 months, which was significantly lower than that of patients with negative expression of β-catenin (42.767±1.679 months) (P<0.05).

Conclusion: The activation of Wnt signalling pathway may play an important role in the expression of lung cancer-related genes. Moreover, the activation of Wnt signalling pathway can cause changes in the status of downstream target genes, which is also an important factor in the occurrence and development of lung cancer.