Expression of CLL Upregulated Gene1(CLLU) ,Telomere Reverse Transcriptase (hTERT) ,Zeta -Associated Protein Kinase -70 (ZAP-70) in patients with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia

Abstract

Abstract Background Defining prognostic tool may help in B-CLL patient subgroups to benefit from early therapeutic intervention. ZAP-70 expression is one marker for IgVH mutational status. hTERT expression discriminated the Ig-unmutated from Ig-mutated B-CLL and may serve as a molecular prognostic marker. CLLU1 expression holds some prognostic information not offered by other biologic markers in B-CLL. This findings drove us forcibly to investigate their expression in B-CLL. Methods The current study was carried out on newly diagnosed 30 B-CLL patients before treatment. In Binet classification ,23% in stage A, 33.3% in stage B and 43.7% in stage C. lymphoadenopathy was in 76.7% , splenomegaly 66.7% ,hepatomegaly 20% of patients. PBMCs were isolated from B-CLL patients and tested by immunocytochemical staining technique for ZAP-70 expression and QRT-PCR for hTERT and CLLU1 expression using cDNA1 for CLLU1 Results ZAP-70 in mononuclear cells was positive in 30% of patients . ZAP-70 was significantly increased with Binet stage progression and . It was positively correlated with TLC and lymphocytic count and negatively correlated with the hemoglobin level and platelets count. The expression levels of hTERT mRNA and CLLU1 mRNA were +ive in all BCLL and -ive in normal cells. They were not correlated with Binet stage, hematological parameters ,ZAP-70 . The expression levels of hTERT and CLLU1 were higher in ZAP-70 positive but statistically non significant Conclusion ZAP-70 expression by Immunocytochemistry is a standardized, simple and inexpensive cost effective as a prognostic. hTERT and CLLU1 expression were novel prognostic markers in B-CLL that can be measured using a rapid and more sensitive method (QRT-PCR) accessible to routine laboratories.