Immunohistochemical Analysis of Lung Adenocarcinoma in Russian Mayak Nuclear Workers

Abstract

Specimens of lung adenocarcinoma (AdCa) from Russian nuclear workers (n = 54) exposed to alpha particles and gamma rays and from individuals non-exposed to radiation (n = 21) were examined using immunohistochemistry. Estimated significant associations with alpha dose were negative for Ki-67 and collagen IV in AdCa. Associations with gamma-ray dose were negative for tissue inhibitor of matrix metalloproteinase 2 and caspase 3 and positive for matrix metalloproteinase 2 and leukemia inhibiting factor in AdCa. The findings provide some evidence supporting alterations in apoptosis, cell proliferation and extracellular matrix in lung tissues affected by chronic radiation exposure that can contribute to radiogenic cancerogenesis.

Keywords:

• Pulmonary adenocarcinoma
• extracellular matrix
• cell proliferation
• programmed cell death
• occupational radiation exposure

Ethical approval

Collection, storage, transfer and analyses of biological specimens and their annotated data on donors comply with the basic principles of human rights protection for research subjects specified in the Fundamentals of Legislation of the Russian Federation on Health Protection of Citizens No. 5487-1 (including amendments in 1993, 1998, 1999 and 2000). Principles of protecting rights and safeguarding the identifiable data are set forth in additional laws, e.g. Law on Information, Information Technologies and Information Protection No. 149-FZ and Law on Personal Data No. 152-FZ. Compliance with the basic principles of human rights protection as research subjects in the RHTR operation is monitored at the local level by the SUBI Institutional Review Board (IRB) that has been recognized by the USA as the IRB of Record, under the Federal-wide Assurance number 00006759, as of April 2004. Only de-identified information was used in the analyses.

Author contributions

All named authors meet the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors criteria for authorship for this article, take responsibility for the integrity of this work as a whole, and have given their approval for this version to be published.

Declaration of Interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the article.

Data availability statement

Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated to carry out this study.

Additional information

Funding

This research was carried out in the framework of the national agreement No. [11.306.12.2] with the Federal Medical Biological Agency of Russia on “Study of cancer and non-cancer effects in Mayak PA workers following chronic radiation exposure” and a cooperative agreement from the U.S. Department of Energy (award number DE-FC01-08HS08032) to the Southern Urals Biophysics Institute and Georgetown University.