Histopathological features and protein ubiquitin immunohistochemical expression in peritumoral tissue of the testicular germ cell tumors

Abstract

Aim. For the purpose of determination of characteristic morphological changes as well as the immunohistochemical protein Ubiquitin expression in peritumoral testicular tissue, which could be characterized as precancer lesions, the 40 patients with testicular germ cell tumors (TGCT) were investigated. Methods and results. Peritumoral testicular tissue in patients with the spermatogenesis alteration (that was detected in 95% of cases) demonstrated: 1) the dramatic increase of ubiquitination processes in seminiferous tubules, confirming the intensive proteolysis of the damaged intracellular proteins, 2) occurrence of atypical germ cells (TIN), which differ from the normal spermatogenesis cells by the authentically lower levels of the nuclear and cytoplasmatic protein Ubiquitin expression, 3) alteration of ubiquitination processes in Leydig cells with the significant increase of the protein Ubiquitin cytoplasmatic expression and the total disappearance of protein Ubiquitin nuclear expression. Conclusion. Our results show the important role of the structural and functional ubiquitin-proteolysis system components alterations at the initial stages of the testicular tissue carcinogenesis.

Keywords

• Ovarian Neoplasms
• Seminiferous Tubules
• Proteins
• TIN