Livin Expression by Semi-quantitative Immuno-flourecent Staining in Hodgkin Lymphoma: A Promising Marker or a Leading Role in Pathogenesis?

A novel human inhibitor of apoptosis protein family member, termed Livin, was demonstrated in the pathogenesis of different human malignancies, and also it was studied as a potential treatment target in malignancies. However, there is no report on the Livin expression profile in Hodgkin Lymphoma. In this study, we evaluated the Livin expression in 78 paraffin embedded blocks including 39 staged cases of Hodgkin Lymphoma and 39 control subjects (normal and reactive hyperplasia lymph nodes). Tissue Microarray-based Semi-quantitative Immuno-flourecent Staining was applied for protein expression profiling in both infiltrating non-neoplastic cells (morphologically typical Lymphocytes) and neoplastic cells (Hodgkin and Reed-Sternberg) of cases and control samples. Our results demonstrated that the mean ratio of Livin/GAPDH expression was significantly increased between infiltrating background cells in Hodgkin Lymphomas and control cases (0.54596 vs. 0.50827, P<0.001). Also, a significant difference was found in the mean ratio of Livin/GAPDH expression between neoplastic cells and major background cells in the tumor microenvironment (0.59024 vs. 0.54596, p<0.001). Furthermore, this study confirmed a significant increase of Livin expression from early-stage to advanced-stage of Hodgkin Lymphoma (0.52888 vs. 0.580146, P<0.01).These findings suggest that Livin may play a critical role in the pathogenesis of Hodgkin Lymphoma. It also can be a novel prognostic marker and a potential therapeutic target in this type of lymphoma.