Shedding of GD2 ganglioside by human neuroblastoma

✍ Scribed by Zi-Liang Wu; Stephan Ladisch; Stephen Feig; Lisa Ulsh; Eileen Schwartz; Grace Floutsis; Frances Wiley; Carl Lenarsky; Robert Seeger

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1987
• Tongue: French
• Weight: 564 KB
• Volume: 39
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0020-7136
• DOI: 10.1002/ijc.2910390113

✦ Synopsis

Substantial concentrations of the cell-surface glycosphingolipid, the disialoganglioside GD2, are uniformly present in human neuroblastoma tumors. This ganglioside can also be detected in the plasma of patients with neuroblastoma by direct thin-layer chromatographic analysis. Among 32 neuroblastoma patients in all clinical stages studied prior to the initiation of treatment, 27 (84%) showed measurably elevated plasma concentrations of GD2 (> 50 pmol/ml). The mean level (545 f 108 pmol/ml) was more than 50 times the normal plasma GDz concentration of < 10 pmol/ml. Circulating GDz was not detected in the plasma of patients with the related, more differentiated tumors, ganglioneuroblastoma and ganglioneuroma, indicating an association of the shedding of this ganglioside with the undifferentiated phenotype. Circulating GD2 diminished in patients in response to therapy, and reappeared in patients whose disease recurred. The results suggest that the sequential determination of circulating GD2 will be of value in monitoring individual patients with neuroblastoma.

Gangliosides are sialic acid-containing glycosphingolipids which are found primarily on the cell membrane. Qualitative differences between the gangliosides of normal tissues and those of tumor tissues (Hakomori and Kannagi, 1983) and evidence that tumor cells shed gangliosides (Ladisch et al., 1983;Shaposhnikova et al., 1984) suggest that certain gangliosides could be useful circulating tumor markers in vivo. ~ ~ 40n sabbatical leave from Guangzhou Medical College, Canton, The People's Republic of China.