Breast cancer humoral immune response: involvement of Lewis y through the detection of circulating immune complexes and association with Mucin 1 (MUC1)

Abstract

Background: In cancer patients, MUC1 glycoprotein may carry Lewis y which could be involved in immune response. Purposes: 1-to evaluate the presence of Lewis y and MUC1 in circulating immune complexes (Lewis y/CIC and MUC1/CIC, respectively) and their correlation; 2-to analyze the possible presence of Lewis y in carbohydrate chains of tumoral MUC1 glycoprotein and 3-to correlate serum and tissue parameters considered.

Cancer vaccines and carbohydrate epitopes

“…Cancers that are known to express Le Y include ovarian [185,190], breast [191], prostate [192], colon [193], and lung [194] cancers of epithelial cell origin [194]. Because the expression of Le Y in normal tissues is low and it is highly expressed in many cancers it is a good potential therapeutic target [194–195].…”

“…Larrain et al looked at the serum of breast cancer patients for circulating immune complexes of antibody to Le Y and the Le Y antigen expressed on Mucin1 (MUC1) [191]. The IgM Le Y circulating immune complex levels correlated with both IgM/IgG MUC1 and IgG Le Y circulating immune complex levels.…”

Invasive breast cancer in Argentine women: association between risk and prognostic factors with antigens of a peptidic and carbohydrate nature

“…19 It is considered that MUC1 is one of the molecules bearing the epitope sialyl Lewis x in cancer cells, 38 as well as other carbohydrate epitopes such as Lewis x and Lewis y. 39 In this report, a positive correlation between MUC1 versus Lewis x (r = 0.8830; P , 0.05) was found and also a tendency between MUC1 and Lewis x apical expression. These results indicate that MUC1 and Lewis x would be coexpressed, which would suggest that this mucin may be a Lewis x carrier.…”

Recent Development in Carbohydrate Based Anticancer Vaccines

“…It can be carried by glycolipids, glycoproteins or mucins, and is highly expressed on a number of cancers of epithelial origin such as colon, [96] lung, [97] breast, [98] prostate [99] , and ovary. [100] It was reported that Le y expression in ovary tumor is relatively uniform compared to other glycolipids.…”