functional folate receptor alpha is elevated in the blood of ovarian cancer patients功能性叶酸受体α是升高血液中卵巢癌患者.pdfVIP

Functional Folate Receptor Alpha Is Elevated in the Blood of Ovarian Cancer Patients 1. 1. 2 2 2 Eati Basal , Guiti Z. Eghbali-Fatourechi , Kimberly R. Kalli , Lynn C. Hartmann , Karin M. Goodman , 3 4 5 1 Ellen L. Goode , Barton A. Kamen , Philip S. Low , Keith L. Knutson * 1 Department of Immunology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, United States of America, 2 Department of Oncology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, United States of America, 3 Department of Health Sciences Research, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, United States of America, 4 The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, White Plains, New York, United States of America, 5 Department of Chemistry, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States of America Abstract Background: Despite low incidence, ovarian cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer deaths and it has the highest mortality rate of all gynecologic malignancies among US women. The mortality rate would be reduced with an early detection marker. The folate receptor alpha (FRa) is one logical choice for a biomarker because of its prevalent overexpression in ovarian cancer and its exclusive expression in only a few normal tissues. In prior work, it was observed that patients with ovarian cancer had elevated serum levels of a protein that bound to a FRa-specific monoclonal antibody relative to healthy individuals. However, it was not shown that the protein detected was intact functional FRa. In the current study, the goal was to determine whether ovarian cancer patients (n = 30) had elevated serum levels of a fully funct