In order to evaluate the possibility that activities of nucleic acid degrading enzymes and nucleic acid contents in the uterine cervix tissues could be used as diagnostic markers for cervical cancer, activities of DNase and RNase and contents of DNA, RNA and protein were determined in the cervical cancer tissues and were compared with those in the normal uterine cervix tissues. Also isolated and fractionated were proteins in the cervical cancer tissues to investigate whether proteins specific for the cervical cancer were present.
1. Activity of acid DNase in cervical cancer tissues was markedly increased as compared with that in normal uterine cervix tissues, but activities of neutral and alkaline DNases were unchanged. As a tumor marker for cervical cancer, the positive rate of acid DNase in the cervical cancer tissues was high up to 83%.
2. Although neutral RNase activity in cervical cancer tissues was significantly decreased as compared with that in normal uterine cervix tissues, the positive rate of neutral RNase in the cervical cancer tissues as a tumor marker for cervical cancer was as low as 19%.
3. DNA, RNA and protein contents in cervical cancer tissues were all significantly increased as compared with those in normal uterine cervix tissues, and the positive rates of DNA, RNA and protein contents in cervical tissues as tumor markers for cervical cancer showed high values between 83 to 100%.
4. Electrophoretic patterns for cervical cancer tissue proteins separated by native-and SDS-PAGE appeared to be different from those for normal uterine cervix tissue proteins. With these results alone, it can not be concluded that proteins specific to cervical cancer were present in the cervical cancer tissues. These results suggested that determination of acid DNase activity and nucleic
acid contents in the uterine cervix tissues obtained from biopsy could be used as
diagnostic markers for cervical cancer.
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