EXPRESSION OF MATRIX METALLOPROTEINASE—7 INVOLVING IN GROWTH, INVASION, METASTASIS AND ANGIOGENESIS OF GASTRIC CANCER

Objective. To investigate the role of matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP-7) expression in caricinogenesisand progression of gastric cancer.Methods. We studied MMP-7 expression and microvessel density (MVD) in adjacent mucosa and pri-mary foci of 113 cases of gastric cancer by streptavidin-biotin-immunoperoxidase method using anti-MMP-7 and anti-CD34 antibodies. MMP-7 expression and mean MVD were compared with clinicopatholog-ical features of gastric cancer, with the relationship between MMP-7 expression and MVD concerned in gastric cancer.Results. MMP-7 showed positive expression in adjacent mucosa of gastric cancer (29.20%, 33/113),less than that in gastric cancer (69.03%, 78/113). MMP-7 expression in primary foci of gastric cancerwas positively correlated with tumor size, invasive depth, metastasis and TNM staging (P＜0.05), but notwith differentiation or growth pattern of gastric cancer (P＞0.05). Positive correlation of mean MVD withtumor size, invasive depth, metastasis and TNM staging was found (P＜0.05), despite no relationshipbetween mean MVD and differentiation of gastric cancer (P＞0.05). Mean MVD was dependent on MMP-7expression in gastric cancer (P＜0.05).Conclusion. Up-regulated expression of MMP-7 played an important role in carcinogenesis and pro-gression by participating in growth, invasion, metastasis and angiogenesis of gastric cancer. MMP-7 ex-pression could be regarded as an effective and objective marker to reflect the biological behaviors of gas-tric cancer.