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Copyright ©The Author(s) 2019. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Meta-Anal. Apr 30, 2019; 7(4): 142-155
Published online Apr 30, 2019. doi: 10.13105/wjma.v7.i4.142
Subcellular expression of maspin – from normal tissue to tumor cells
Laura Banias, Ioan Jung, Simona Gurzu
Laura Banias, Ioan Jung, Simona Gurzu, Department of Pathology, University of Medicine, Pharmacy, Sciences and Technology of Tirgu-Mures, Tirgu Mures 540139, Romania
Laura Banias, Simona Gurzu, Department of Pathology, Clinical County Emergency Hospital, Tirgu Mures 540139, Romania
Author contributions: Banias L designed the research and drafted the article; Jung I analyzed the literature data and revised the collected data; Gurzu S designed the research and approved the final draft; Banias L and Jung I are co-first authors, having an equal contribution to the paper.
Supported by Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research, CNCS – UEFISCDI, No. 20 PCCF/2018, code: PN-III-P4-ID-PCCF-2016-0006.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflict of interest to report.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Simona Gurzu, MD, PhD, Professor, Head, Department of Pathology, University of Medicine, Pharmacy, Sciences and Technology, 38 Gheorghe Marinescu Street, Targu Mures 530149, Romania. simona.gurzu@umfst.ro
Telephone: +40-745-673550 Fax: +40-265-210407
Received: March 18, 2019
Peer-review started: March 19, 2019
First decision: April 18, 2019
Revised: April 22, 2019
Accepted: April 23, 2019
Article in press: April 23, 2019
Published online: April 30, 2019
Processing time: 43 Days and 8.2 Hours
Abstract

Maspin or SerpinB5, a member of the serine protease inhibitor family, was shown to function as a tumor suppressor, especially in carcinomas. It seems to inhibit invasion, tumor cells motility and angiogenesis, and promotes apoptosis. Maspin can also induce epigenetic changes such as cytosine methylation, de-acetylation, chromatin condensation, and histone modulation. In this review, a comprehensive synthesis of the literature was done to present maspin function from normal tissues to pathologic conditions. Data was sourced from MEDLINE and PubMed. Study eligibility criteria included: Published in English, between 1994 and 2019, specific to humans, and with full-text availability. Most of the 118 studies included in the present review focused on maspin immunostaining and mRNA levels. It was shown that maspin function is organ-related and depends on its subcellular localization. In malignant tumors, it might be downregulated or negative (e.g., carcinoma of prostate, stomach, and breast) or upregulated (e.g., colorectal and pancreatic tumors). Its subcellular localization (nuclear vs cytoplasm), which can be proved using immunohistochemical methods, was shown to influence both tumor behavior and response to chemotherapy. Although the number of maspin-related papers increased, the exact role of this protein remains unknown, and its interpretation should be done with extremely high caution.

Keywords: Maspin; SerpinB5; Prognosis; Cancer; Tumor suppressor

Core tip: The present paper concentrated on showing different patterns of immunohistochemical expression and mRNA levels of maspin, as presented in published studies from 1994 until the beginning of 2019 that were included in the PubMed database. It was shown that maspin, a member of the serine protease inhibitor family, functions as a tumor suppressor or tumor promoter. Its function is organ-related and depends on its subcellular localization. In colorectal cancer specimens, maspin was a helpful marker of budding assessment. In most of the malignant tumors, it was demonstrated to be an independent prognostic and predictive factor.