Evaluating the expression of Snail genes in prostate cancer

Prostate cancer (PCa) is the second most common malignancy in men worldwide. Because it is known that the inappropriate activation of necessary process for fetal development in adult has the potency of leading to pathological conditions, the hypothesis has been raised that the reactivation of some aspects of the embryonic epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) program could underlie the mechanism of tumour invasion. Snail and slug are zinc-finger proteins acting primarily as the survival factors and inducers of cell motion. In the present study, the expression of snail genes in prostate cancer was evaluated. In the present case-control study, the whole RNA content was extracted from the normal and prostate cancerous tissues and used for cDNA synthesis. Due to Snail genes some limitations of obtaining complete normal samples in the control group, samples from open prostatectomy were used. To quantify the expression of snail genes, the synthesized cDNA was amplified by Real-Time PCR. Data were analyzed using student t- test. Our data showed that both genes were expressed in normal and cancerous tissues and there was no significant difference in the gene expression between normal and cancerous tissues (P = 0.35 and P = 0.06 for snail and slug genes, respectively). The observed heterogeneity could reflect the dynamic and reversible nature of EMT during progression and metastasis of prostate tumours.