OBJECTIVE Maspin, a 42-kDa protein, belongs to the serpin family of protease inhibitors and is known to have tumor-suppressor function. In this study, we investigated the interrelationship between clinicopathologic findings and maspin expression in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). METHODS Using immunohistochemical techniques to examine the expression levels of maspin in OSCC, maspin expre...

Maspin is a novel serine protease inhibitor (serpin) with tumor suppressive potential in breast and prostate cancer, acting at the level of tumor invasion and metastasis. It was subsequently demonstrated that maspin inhibits tumor invasion, at least in part, by inhibiting cell motility. Interestingly, in cell-free solutions, maspin does not inhibit several serine proteases including tissue-type...

Emerging evidence indicates that tumor-associated proteolytic remodeling of bone matrix may underlie the capacity of tumor cells to colonize and survive in the bone microenvironment. Of particular importance, urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) has been shown to correlate with human prostate cancer (PC) metastasis. The importance of this protease may be related to its ability to initiate...

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to investigate the expression level of maspin mRNA in pulmonary adenocarcinoma and to clarify its clinical significance in prediction of prognosis. MATERIAL/METHODS RNA was extracted from formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tumor tissue blocks of 30 pairs of pulmonary adenocarcinoma (AC) tissues and adjacent noncancerous tissues (ANT) and in another 81...

Maspin, a novel mammary serine protease inhibitor, was shown to have tumor suppressing activity (Zou, Z., Anisowicz, A., Hendrix, M. J. C., Thor, A., Neveu, M., Sheng, S., Rafidi, K., Seftor, E., and Sager, R. (1994) Science 263, 526-529). In this paper, we report the production of recombinant glutathione S-transferase-maspin fusion protein, expressed in the bacterium Escherichia coli, and reco...

The maspin protein has tumor suppressor activity in breast and prostate cancers. It inhibits cell motility and invasion in vitro and tumor growth and metastasis in nude mice. Maspin is structurally a member of the serpin (serine protease inhibitors) superfamily but deviates somewhat from classical serpins. We find that single-chain tissue plasminogen activator (sctPA) specifically interacts wit...

BACKGROUND Various angiogenic regulators are involved in angiogenesis cascade. Transcription factor Ets-1 plays important role in angiogenesis, remodeling of extracellular matrix, and tumor metastasis. Ets-1 target genes involved in various stages of new blood vessel formation include angiopoietin, matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) and the protease inhibitor maspin. METHODS We used immunohisto...

Maspin (SERPINB5) is a tumor suppressor lost in breast and prostate cancer whose molecular function is unknown. It is a non-inhibitory member of the clade B serpins suggested to play a role in a plethora of intracellular and extracellular settings, yet its normal cellular distribution has never been clarified. Here we investigate the distribution of maspin in non-transformed human epithelial ce...

Prostate cancer (PCa) progression is an intricate step-wise process, starting from malignant transformations in the benign prostatic epithelium. The hallmark of PCa is the long period of its development from premalignant transformations in the benign prostatic epithelium towards clinically active carcinoma. Along with the age, inflammation, race and genetics, which are well-recognized risk fact...

Maspin is a unique serpin with the ability to suppress certain types of malignant tumors. It is one of the few p53-targeted genes involved in tumor invasion and metastasis. With this in mind, we attempted to study the molecular mechanism behind this tumor suppression. Maspin-expressing mammary tumors are more susceptible to apoptosis in both implanted mammary tumors in vivo, a three-dimensional...