Altered Tissue and Plasma Levels of Fibroblast Activation Protein-α (FAP) in Renal Tumours

(1) Background: Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is a heterogeneous and complex disease with only partial response to therapy, high incidence of metastasis and recurrences, and scarce reliable biomarkers indicative of progression and survival. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) play an important role su...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cancers 2020-11, Vol.12 (11), p.3393
Main Authors: Solano-Iturri, Jon Danel, Errarte, Peio, Etxezarraga, María C., Echevarria, Enrique, Angulo, Javier, López, José I., Larrinaga, Gorka
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biomarkers
Biopsy
Cancer therapies
Cell surface
Clear cell-type renal cell carcinoma
Developmental stages
Differential diagnosis
Fibroblast activation protein
Fibroblasts
Gender
Immunohistochemistry
Kidney cancer
Kinases
Lymph nodes
Medical prognosis
Metastases
Metastasis
Papillary renal cell carcinoma
Plasma
Plasma levels
Proteins
Renal cell carcinoma
Tumors
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:(1) Background: Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is a heterogeneous and complex disease with only partial response to therapy, high incidence of metastasis and recurrences, and scarce reliable biomarkers indicative of progression and survival. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) play an important role supporting and promoting renal cancer progression. (2) Methods: In this study, we analysed fibroblast activation protein-α (FAP) immunohistochemical expression and its soluble isoform (sFAP) in tumour tissues and plasma from 128 patients with renal tumours. (3) Results: FAP is expressed in the cell surface of CAFs of the tumour centre and infiltrating front from clear cell renal cell carcinomas (CCRCC, n = 89), papillary renal cell carcinomas (PRCC, n = 21), and chromophobe renal cell carcinomas (ChRCC, n = 8), but not in the benign tumour renal oncocytoma (RO, n = 10). A high expression of FAP and low levels sFAP are significantly associated with high tumour diameter, high grade, and high pT stage, lymph node invasion, development of early metastases, and worse 5-year cancer specific survival of CCRCC patients. (4) Conclusions: These findings corroborate the potential usefulness of FAP immunohistochemistry and plasma sFAP as a biomarker of CCRCC progression and point to CAF-related proteins as promising immunohistochemical biomarkers for the differential diagnosis of ChRCC and RO.
ISSN:2072-6694
2072-6694
DOI:10.3390/cancers12113393