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. 2018 Apr;15(4):5087-5092.
doi: 10.3892/ol.2018.7990. Epub 2018 Feb 7.

Gastric cancer patients have elevated plasmacytoid and CD1c+ dendritic cells in the peripheral blood

Weihuang Liu  1 , Jie Zhao  1 , Qiaoqi Li  1 , Qiaona Wang  1 , Ying Zhou  1 , Zan Tong  1
Affiliations

Gastric cancer patients have elevated plasmacytoid and CD1c+ dendritic cells in the peripheral blood

Weihuang Liu et al. Oncol Lett. 2018 Apr.

Abstract

Dendritic cells (DCs) are important in tumor immunology. Identifying DC subset markers in the peripheral blood, which are informative for gastric cancer stages, is not only useful for prognosis but may also provide mechanistic insights into processes facilitating therapy. The present study investigated plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) and myeloid CD1c+ dendritic cells (mDC1s) in the peripheral blood of patients with gastric cancer and healthy controls using flow cytometry. Using peripheral DC staining and subset analysis, patients with gastric cancer were identified to have substantially higher numbers of peripheral pDCs and mDC1s. In addition, there was a trend of elevated circulating pDCs with advanced stages and lymph node metastasis in gastric cancer, whereas no differences in circulating mDC1s were observed among the various groups. The results suggested that circulating pDCs are a positive prognostic indicator in patients with gastric cancer of different stages and highlighted the critical role of pDCs immunity in the development of gastric cancer.

Keywords: dendritic cell; gastric cancer; myeloid dendritic cell; plasmacytoid dendritic cell.

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Number of leukocytes in the peripheral blood of different human groups. (A) Patients with gastric cancer and control group. (B) Patients with gastric cancer stage TNM I+II, stage TNM III+IV and control group. (C) Patients with LN-neg gastric cancer, metastatic (LN-pos) gastric cancer and control group. ***P<0.001. TNM, tumor-node-metastasis; LN, lymph node; neg, negative; pos, positive.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Reprehensive flow cytometric analysis of blood cells and DC subsets. (A) Forward scatter and side scatter dot plot of blood cells with P1 (circled) region gated to exclude debris and platelets. (B) P2 region (red) was gated on P1 to further exclude B cells, monocytes, granulocytes and dead cells. (C) P3 region (blue) was gated on P2 to determine BDCA-1+ mDC1 subset and P4 region (orange) was gated on P2 to determine BDCA-2+ pDC subset. (D) BDCA-2+ pDC subset and PD-L1 analysis of P2 population. (E) BDCA-1+ mDC1 subset and PD-L1 analysis of P2 population. pDC, plasmacytoid dendritic cell; mDC, myeloid dendritic cell.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Quantitation of pDC and mDC1 subsets in the peripheral blood of patients with gastric cancer and controls. (A) Percentage of pDCs in the leukocytes. (B) Absolute number of pDCs. (C) Percentage of mDC1s in the leukocytes. (D) Absolute number of mDC1s. **P<0.01; ***P<0.001. pDCs, plasmacytoid dendritic cells; mDC, myeloid dendritic cell.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Quantitation of pDC and mDC1 subsets in the peripheral blood of patients with gastric cancer at different TNM stages. (A) Percentage of pDCs in the leukocytes. (B) Absolute number of pDCs. (C) Percentage of mDC1s in the leukocytes. (D) Absolute number of mDC1s. *P<0.05; **P<0.01; ***P<0.001. pDCs, plasmacytoid dendritic cells; mDC, myeloid dendritic cell; TNM, tumor-node-metastasis.
Figure 5.
Figure 5.
Quantitation of pDC and mDC1 subsets in the peripheral blood of patients with gastric cancer with different LN metastasis status. (A) Percentage of pDCs in the leukocytes. (B) Absolute number of pDCs. (C) Percentage of mDC1s in the leukocytes. (D) Absolute number of mDC1s. *P<0.05; **P<0.01; ***P<0.001. pDCs, plasmacytoid dendritic cells; mDC, myeloid dendritic cell; LN, lymph node; neg, negative; pos, positive.
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