Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UNIPROT:P02794 (ferritin)
 17,525 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

An electron microscopic (EM) study of 25 Kaposi's sarcomas (KS) (24 cutaneous lesions, 1 lymphnodal) from 23 patients, mainly sporadic in type, has enabled us to study both the spindle and endothelial cells seen by light microscopy (LM) with the conclusion that they have both a fibroblastic-like EM aspect. Both cell types manifested a spindle shape with oval and occasionally notched nuclei and a reticular pattern of nucleoli. The cytoplasm was characterized by numerous rough endoplasmic reticulum cisternae with few other organelles. The plasma membranes consistently lacked an external or basal membrane and failed to show true cell junctions. In cells delimiting erythrocytes containing spaces it was never possible to document Weibel-Palade (W.-P.) bodies or plasmalemmal vesicles. Unusual findings such as ferritin loaded phagosomes, microtubular reticular structures (MTRS), intracisternal crystalline inclusions (ICCI), multivesicular bodies (MVB), acanthosomic vesicles (AV) and test-tube inclusions or ring-shaped forms (TTI/RSF) were occasionally seen in both sporadic and epidemic KS. The authors discuss the non specific nature of these latter findings.
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PMID:Ultrastructural study of Kaposi's sarcoma. 876 87

Iron is suspected to be involved in the induction and/or progression of various human tumors. More particularly, we have previously shown that iron may be involved in the pathogenesis of Kaposi's sarcoma (KS). We have also shown that the iron chelator desferrioxamine (DFO) has a potent anti-KS activity in vitro, suggesting that it may represent a potential therapeutic approach for the treatment of KS. The present study was designed to investigate the effect of DFO on the growth of human KS xenografts in immunodeficient mice. Unexpectedly, we found that mice treated with DFO (400 mg/kg, 3 times weekly) (n = 30) exhibited a marked enhancement of tumor growth compared with control mice (n = 33) (230 +/- 134 mm(2) versus 143 +/- 70 mm p < 0.01). No enhancement of tumor growth was seen in mice treated with iron-saturated DFO. At least 2 findings suggest that this paradoxic pro-KS activity occurred independently of mice iron stores. First, treatment with DFO had only a marginal effect on ferritin and hematocrit levels. Second, induction of effective iron depletion by an iron-poor diet (6.7 mg iron/kg diet) (n = 23) did not have a deleterious effect on the growth of the KS xenografts. The lesions obtained from the DFO-treated animals exhibited a significantly decreased apoptotic index (p < 0.05), indicating that some antiapoptotic mechanism induced by DFO may be operating in vivo to favour tumor growth. In conclusion, our data show that DFO has a stimulatory effect on KS growth in immunodeficient mice, suggesting that this drug is not indicated in patients with KS.
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PMID:Desferrioxamine enhances AIDS-associated Kaposi's sarcoma tumor development in a xenograft model. 1211 61

The immunotherapeutic treatment of cancers using antibodies (naked or conjugated to a drug, toxin, or radionuclide) relies upon the preferential expression of a targeted antigen on the cancer cell compared to normal tissues. Polyclonal antiferritin antisera have shown selective distribution and therapeutic efficacy when radiolabeled in Hodgkin's disease and hepatoma. In this immunohistochemical study, we investigated the distribution of ferritin in tumors from 6 patients with Kaposi's sarcoma, 12 patients with Hodkgin's disease, and 9 patients with hepatoma, as well as in selected normal tissues. We found that the monoclonal antiferritin antibody binds primarily to histiocytes in samples from Kaposi's sarcoma and Hodgkin's disease. One hepatocellular carcinoma showed diffuse cytoplasmic staining with ferritin. Deposition of the monoclonal antibody was not detectable in the remaining hepatocellular carcinoma samples.
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PMID:Distribution of monoclonal antiferritin antibody in Kaposi's sarcoma, Hodgkin's disease, and hepatocellular carcinoma. 1273 20

Kaposi sarcoma (KS) is a complex disease with aspects of virology (human herpesvirus-8, HHV-8, and human immunodeficiency virus, HIV), immunology (immunodeficiency), hyperplasia (multiple widely spaced de novo lesions), and neoplasia (metastases) that has always been the most common AIDS-defining malignancy. The lesional spindle cell has been classified as being derived from either blood vascular or, more recently, lymphatic endothelial cell origin. This study revealed a spectrum of endothelial cell ultrastructure from lymphatic to blood vascular. It demonstrated frequent Weibel-Palade bodies and gap junctions. The spindle cells were shown to behave as facultative phagocytes, internalizing and processing necrotic cells and leaked red blood cells (RBCs). Fragmented RBCs were equivalent to the "hyaline droplets" seen by light microscopy. The final stages of RBC disintegration were hemosiderin and ferritin. Most significantly, this study disclosed that KS is actually composed of a single type of randomly oriented spindle cell forming vessels of varying size and integrity.
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PMID:Ultrastructure of Kaposi sarcoma. 1895 95