TSGA10, as a Cancer/Testis gene: review article

Cancer/Testis antigens (CTAs) as a group of tumor antigens are the novel subjects for developing cancer vaccine and immunotherapy approaches. They aberrantly express in tumors with highest normal expression in testis, and limited or no expression in normal tissues. There are important similarities between the processes of germ-cell and cancer cell development Spermatogenesis begins at puberty when expression of novel cell-surface antigens occurs when the immune system has been refined the ability to distinguish self from non-self. Whereas macrophage and lymphocytes are commonly found within interstitial spaces of the testis, these antigen-presenting cells are rarely seen within the seminiferous tubules. These observations have led to the concept of the immune privileged site for testis. Localized normal expression of the CT genes in testis that makes them immunogenic for immune system, in one side, and their abnormal expression in different kinds of cancer cells, in the other side, has make them as promising target for developing cancer vaccines and new cancer therapeutics approaches. In malignancies, gene regulation is disrupted which results aberrant expression of CT antigen in a proportion of tumors of various types. For some CTAs, data support their fundamental role in tumorigenesis. Several authors believe it is not clear whether they have an essential role in tumorigenesis or they are by-products of chromatin variations in cancer. There is a growing list of CTAs within them advanced clinical trials are running by using some of them in cancers like lung cancer, malignant melanoma and neuroblastoma. In this review we discuss the gene TSGA10 as an example of CT genes. TSGA10 expresses in its highest levels in elongating spermatids and localized in the fibrous sheath of mature sperm. This gene is proposed as a serological biomarker in cutaneous lymphoma. Its abnormal expression has been reported in different cancers such as acute lymphoblastic leukemia, breast, brain, gastrointestinal and a range of other cancers either in mRNA or protein levels. It has an important role in angiogenesis in cancer tumors because of its effects in the gene hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF1). Absence or lack of TSGA10 expression has been reported in ascosporic infertile men.