Clinico-pathological significance of Drp1 dysregulation and its correlation to apoptosis in oral cancer patients.

Dysregulation in mitochondrial dynamics has been associated with several diseases including cancer. Present study assessed the alteration in mitochondrial fission protein (Drp1) in oral epithelial cells collected from clinically confirmed pre-cancer and cancer patients and further correlates it with the cellular apoptosis signaling. Results indicate the ROS accumulation in OSCC patients is accompanied by several changes including increase in mitochondrial mass, expression of mitochondrial fission protein (Drp1) and alteration in apoptotic signaling. The positive co-relation has been observed between the expressions of anti-apoptotic Bcl-2proteinswith mitochondrial fission protein Drp1. Higher mitochondrial fission in oral cancer cells was also correlated with the increased expression of cell cycle marker CyclinD1 indicating highly proliferative stage of oral cancer cells. The clinical correlation can be extended to develop biomarker for diagram and program in oral cancer management.