Expression of Mucin Carbohydrate Antigen, sTn and Tn in Patients with Ulcerative Colitis(UC)

Chang, Moo Sun; Do, Jae Hyuk; Kim, Hyung Jun; Yoo, Kyung Kum; Park, Soo Jeong; Moon, Cheol; Heo, Cheol Heang; Kim, Jae Gyu; Chang, Sae Kyung; Park, Sil Moo; Kim, Mi Kyung

Abstract

OBJECTIVES
Long standing observation, which may relate either to the causes or the effects of UC, reveals that there is a pronounced alteration of mucin such as quantitative and qualitative abnormalities of mucin glycoprotein. But recently in situ hybridization technique showed no specific difference in the expression of apomucin mRNA in UC. Therefore we investigated whether abnormality of mucin was originated from defect in glycosylation. And we also tried to find differences in the expression of Tn and sTn antigens between Korean and Jewish patients with UC.
METHODS
We performed the immunohistochemical staining using the monoclonal antibody of mucin carbohydrate antigens Tn and sTn in 19 patients with UC.
RESULTS
Tn and sTn antigens were not expressed throughout the crypt and surface epithelium in normal colon but both of mucin carbohydrates antigens were well expressed in mild UC, Tn antigen was seen in the surface epithelium with perinuclear pattern and sTn antigen was shown not only in surface but also in crypt epithelium. In severe UC, Tn antigen was well expressed, but sTn antigen was not expressed. Tn antigen seemed to be ex-pressed more frequently than sTn antigen with severity of inflammation. These results were similar in Korean and Jewish patients with UC.
CONCLUSION
These results suggest that inflammatory bowel disease has some deterioration in the step of glycosylation in the cytoplasm and there was no racial difference in the expression of Tn and sTn antigen in Korean and Jewish patients with UC.