engleski

Expression of tumour necrosis factor-like weak inducer of apoptosis in normal human skin, inflammatory dermatoses and non-melanoma skin cancer

Tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-like weak inducer of apoptosis (TWEAK) is a member of the TNF superfamily of cytokines that possesses a variety of biological effects including stimulation of cell growth and angiogenesis, tissue regeneration, induction of proinflammatory cytokines and stimulation of apoptosis. To investigate the role of TWEAK in skin biology, we performed immunofluorescent analyses of TWEAK expression in normal human skin, psoriasis, lichen planus, actinic keratosis (AK), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and basal cell carcinoma (BCC). In normal epidermis, strong positive cytoplasmic staining for TWEAK was observed in all keratinocyte layers except the basal cell layer which was entirely unstained. Similar pattern of staining was found in psoriasis with clearly observable difference between unstained basal and occasional suprabasal cells and strongly stained upper layers of epidermis. This "clear cut" difference in the staining pattern was not observed in lesions of lichen planus, where the overall staining intensity was decreased but occasional positively stained nuclei were also detected. Decreased staining was additionally observed in AK, particularly in the areas of cellular atypia. In SCC, strong signal was seen in the well-differentiated keratinocytes around squamous pearls whereas poorly differentiated cells showed weak or absent signal. In BCC, TWEAK was almost completely absent, with only a few individual cells in a limited number of BCCs positively stained. In conclusion, these data suggest that TWEAK is associated with keratinocyte differentiation in normal skin, inflammatory dermatoses and non-melanoma skin cancer and that it is possibly involved in the apoptotic keratinocyte death in lichen planus.

TWEAK; psoriasis; lichen planus; skin cancer

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