Tumoral Cell mtDNA ∼8.9 kb Deletion Is More Common than Other Deletions in Gastric Cancer

BackgroundThe aim of the study was to clarify the role of deletion of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) in gastric carcinogenesis and to determine prevalence of mitochondrial deletions in different regions of tumoral tissue in comparison with adjacent non-tumoral tissue in gastric cancer.MethodsIn order to investigate whether a high incidence of mutations exists in mtDNA of gastric cancer tissues, we screened five regions of the mitochondrial genome by PCR amplification, Southern blot and DNA sequence analysis.ResultsOf 71 cancer patients, the ∼8.9 kb deletion was detected among different deletions in 9 cases (12.67%) of the tumoral tissues and 1 case (1.40%) in non-tumoral tissues that were adjacent to the tumors. Level of the 8.9 kb deletion has been found to be more than other deletions in tumoral tissues.ConclusionsThe ∼8.9 kb deletion has an obvious correlation with age and histological type. These data suggest that the ∼8.9 kb deletion in mtDNA may play an important role in gastric carcinogenesis.