Esophageal cancer is the sixth leading cause of cancer death and remains one of the least survivable cancers. Esophageal cancers show wide variations in incidence in different population, suggesting that environmental or lifestyle risk factors could be controlled to reduce risk of these diseases. There are two major histopathologic types (squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma) of esophagea...

BACKGROUND Kallikreins (KLKs) are a group of 15 secreted serine proteases. Some KLKs are established or candidate cancer biomarkers, but for most the physiological function is unknown. We characterized the protein and mRNA abundance patterns of all 15 KLKs in multiple panels of human tissues and biological fluids. METHODS We used sensitive and specific sandwich-type ELISAs for each KLK. Rever...

Esophageal cancer is the seventh leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide (410,000 new cases annually)(1). Asian, Middle Eastern, and East African countries have a markedly higher incidence of esophageal cancer than other areas. In the United States, the incidence of adenocarcinoma of the distal esophagus and gastroesophageal junction has progressively increased to approximately 70% of all esop...

The incidence of esophageal cancer varies widely in the world. In the Middle East, Africa, and Asia and parts of Europe, squamous cell carcinoma of the esophagus dominates the esophageal cancer landscape. Worldwide the rates are highest in Northern China, South Africa, Turkey and Iran. In the United States, the black population has a five-fold higher incidence of esophageal squamous cell carcin...

Esophageal adenocarcinoma and its precursor, Barrett's esophagus, are rapidly rising in incidence. This review serves to highlight the role of pharmacologic, endoscopic, and surgical intervention in the management of Barrett's esophagus, which requires acid suppression and endoscopic assessment. Treatment with a proton pump inhibitor may decrease acid exposure and delay the progression to dyspl...

Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) in humans is a deadly disease associated with dietary zinc (Zn)-deficiency. In the rat esophagus, Zn-deficiency induces cell proliferation, alters mRNA and microRNA gene expression, and promotes ESCC. We investigated whether Zn-deficiency alters cell metabolism by evaluating metabolomic profiles of esophageal epithelia from Zn-deficient and replenished ...

The 7th edition of Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) staging system moved gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) cancers from gastric to esophageal group. Since clinical management is strongly influenced by this staging system, we looked at molecular fingerprints of GEJ tumors and compared to gastric and esophageal profiles. We aimed at elucidating whether GEJ cancers cluster with gastric ...

In a retrospective study, interviews were obtained with 3.716 patients with histologically proven cancer of the lung (Kreyberg types I and II). mouth, larynx, esophagus, or bladder and with over 18.000 controls. For each of these cancers, the relative risk of both male and female present smokers increased with the quantity smoked and the dura tion of the habit. The strongest increase occurred f...

Esophageal adenocarcinoma is an increasingly common disease with a dismal 5-year survival rate of 10% to 15%. In the first systematic evaluation of the PD-1 pathway in esophageal adenocarcinoma, we identify expression of PD-L2 in cancer cells in 51.7% of esophageal adenocarcinomas. Epithelial PD-L1 was expressed on only 2% of cases, although PD-L1þ immune cells were observed in 18% of esophagea...