Expression status of candidate genes in mesothelioma tissues and cell lines

• To shed light on the expression status of genes potentially involved in MPM.
• Analysis of a large panel of mRNA markers in MPM patients’ tissues and in MPM cell lines.
• Identification of 59 differentially expressed genes between MPM and normal pleura.
• Identification of BIRC5, DSP, NME2, and THBS2 as putative prognostic markers for MPM.
• Importance of cell–cell and cell–matrix interactions in MPM pathogenesis.

In order to broaden knowledge on the pathogenesis of malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM), we reviewed studies on the MPM-transcriptome and identified 119 deregulated genes. However, there was poor consistency among the studies. Thus, the expression of these genes was further investigated in the present work using reverse transcriptase-quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) in 15 MPM and 20 non-MPM tissue samples. Fifty-nine genes showed a statistically significant deregulation and were further evaluated in two epithelioid MPM cell lines (compared to MET-5A, a non-MPM cell line). Nine genes (ACSL1, CCNO, CFB, PDGFRB, SULF1, TACC1, THBS2, TIMP3, XPOT) were deregulated with statistical significance in both cell lines, 12 (ASS1, CCNB1, CDH11, COL1A1, CXADR, EIF4G1, GALNT7, ITGA4, KRT5, PTGIS, RAN, SOD1) in at least one cell line, whereas 7 (DSP, HEG1, MCM4, MSLN, NME2, NMU, TNPO2) were close but did not reach the statistical significance in any of the cell line. Patients whose MPM tissues expressed elevated mRNA levels of BIRC5, DSP, NME2, and THBS2 showed a statistically significant shorter overall survival. Although MPM is a poorly studied cancer, some features are starting to emerge. Novel cancer genes are suggested here, in particular those involved in cell–cell and cell–matrix interactions.