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The expression of hepatocyte nuclear estrogen receptor (ER) in putative preneoplastic foci, adenomas and carcinomas, induced by the rat liver carcinogen tamoxifen, has been examined immunohistologically. ER staining of normal rat liver shows between 30-50% of hepatocyte nuclei to be positive, depending on fixation. Depletion of ER was defined as <10% of cells in foci or tumours staining for nuclear ER. A proportion of all but the smallest glutathione-S-transferase, placental form (GST-P) expressing foci had depleted expression of nuclear ER. The percentage of GST-P expressing foci with depletion of nuclear ER increased with the size of the foci. The liver adenomas and carcinomas induced by tamoxifen showed a high incidence (90%) of depletion of ER. This suggests that abnormal expression of the ER is associated with the promotion of putative preneoplastic foci to adenomas and carcinomas in tamoxifen exposed rat livers. Dysfunction of the ER could contribute to selective continued stimulation of initiated cells that would be consistent with a role for modification of the ER in target cells and the promotion stage of liver cancer. Liver tumours induced by other carcinogens in both sexes of rat were also found to have a high incidence of ER depletion, indicating that this could be a general regulatory mechanism for rat liver tumour promotion, irrespective of the possible estrogen like action of individual carcinogens. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Diethylnitrosamine (DEN) was administered to rats as a single dose, which is known not to give rise to liver tumours without subsequent promotion. Iron dextran (Fe/Dex) was then administered parenterally to the animals, to induce iron overload. At 3 and 6 months after the final Fe/Dex treatments, livers were examined quantitatively for the numbers of the placental form of glutathione-S-transferase (GST-P) expressing foci, the area occupied by these foci and their size distribution. The results demonstrate that iron not only increased the number of foci after DEN initiation in the rat liver, but that the area occupied by these lesions increased significantly between 3 and 6 months after initiation. There is no evidence that iron increased the number of GST-P expressing foci present in rats not exposed to DEN. This indicates that iron did not act as an initiator in this rodent model of liver cancer. The increase in the area of the liver occupied by the foci in iron and DEN treated rats was due to an increase in the size of the foci, as well as to an increase in the number of foci. This is the first demonstration that iron can act as a promoter of DEN initiated hepatocytes. It also demonstrates that fibrogenesis is not an absolute requirement for the promotion, by iron, of liver foci in the rat, and that this could also be the case for iron overload in man. Iron may also act as a promoter of already initiated hepatocytes in the development of human liver cancer, as it does in the rat. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Treatment of p53(-/-) mice orally with caffeine, voluntary exercise or their combination for 2 weeks prior to a single irradiation with UVB (i) decreased the weight of the epididymal fat pads by 22, 40 and 56%, (ii) decreased the thickness of the dermal fat layer by 10, 26 and 42%, (iii) increased the number of apoptotic sunburn cells by 29, 100 and 489%, (iv) increased the number of caspase-3-positive cells by 33, 117 and 667% and (v) increased the number of mitotic cells with cyclin B1-positive staining by 40, 210 and 510%, respectively. Pearson's correlation coefficient indicated a statistically significant inverse relationship between the level of tissue fat and the number of mitotic cells with cyclin B1 in p53(-/-) mice but not in p53(+/+) littermates. Western blot analysis indicated that treatment of p53(-/-) mice with caffeine together with exercise increased the level of cyclin B1 significantly more than in p53(+/+) mice. p53(-/-) mice, but not p53(+/+) mice, treated with caffeine during exercise exhibited a dramatic decrease in the level of survivin. Our results suggest that voluntary exercise in combination with oral caffeine may exert a synergistic increase in UVB-induced apoptosis and that tissue fat may be a more important modulator of apoptosis and carcinogenesis in p53-deficient mice than in p53-normal mice. The stimulatory effects on apoptosis in p53(-/-) mice by the combination treatment might be associated with increased levels of cyclin B1 and decreased levels of survivin.