Serum salusins levels are increased and correlated positively with cyst size in ovarian endometrioma

The role of adropin, salusin-α, netrin-1, and nesfatin-1 in endometriosis and their association with insulin resistance

Objective:

The pathogenesis of endometriosis has not been clearly explained. Inflammatory factors of ectopic implantation and the growth of ectopic endometrial cells have been subjects of major interest. The number of studies evaluating salusin-α and nesfatin-1 markers in patients with endometriosis is limited. No studies have evaluated the levels of anti-inflammatory markers for adropin and netrin-1 in patients with endometriosis. This study investigates how some important inflammatory regulatory markers in the inflammatory process affect the pathogenesis of endometriosis and determines whether any relationship exists between serum levels of these parameters and endometriosis and insulin resistance.

Materials and Methods:

This prospective study included 73 patients with endometriosis diagnosed histopathologically after laparoscopic surgery and 75 healthy controls. Serum adropin, salusin-α, netrin-1, and nesfatin-1 levels and homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) values of the participants were measured.

Results:

The endometriosis group had significantly lower nesfatin-1 levels than the control group (3.0±0.53 vs 9.5±0.94, p=0.005). Between the patient and control groups, there was no difference regarding serum adropin, salusin-α, and netrin-1 levels (p=0.36, p=0.34, p=0.75, respectively). Nesfatin-1 had a significant positive correlation with adropin, salusin-α, and netrin-1 (r=0.563, p<0.01; r=0.738, p<0.01; r=0.700, p<0.01, respectively), but had a negative correlation with fasting blood glucose (r=−0.343, p<0.05). HOMA-IR values were comparable between both groups.

Conclusion:

The lower nesfatin-1 levels leading to increased inflammatory pathway activity in patients with endometriosis might play a role in endometriosis pathogenesis. Without causing systemic insulin resistance, decreased nesfatin-1 might contribute to endometriosis pathogenesis locally by leading to the reduced insulin susceptibility of endometriosis cells.

Overexpression of salusin-β is associated with poor prognosis in ovarian cancer

Ovarian cancer is recognized as one of the worst gynecologic malignancies associated with rapid metastasis and poor overall survival rate. The identified valuable molecular biomarkers criticize importance of timely diagnosis for ovarian cancer. Salusin-β levels are dramatically increased in women with polycystic ovarian syndrome. However, the roles of salusin-β in ovarian cancer have yet to be fully elucidated. A total of 57 paired ovarian cancer specimens and matched adjacent normal tissues were used to measure the salusin-β levels. The prognostic value of salusin-β for tumor progression and survival rate was investigated. The effects of salusin-β on ovarian cancer cell proliferation and epithelial-mesenchymal transition were also explored. The expression of salusin-β was significantly increased in ovarian cancer tissue specimens compared with matched normal adjacent tissue (P<0.05). The high salusin-β level was closely related with FIGO stage and lymph node metastases. The ovarian cancer patients with high salusin-β had a shorter overall survival (P<0.05). Salusin-β obviously enhanced the proliferation and epithelial mesenchymal-transition of SKOV3 cells. Furthermore, salusin-β substantially decreased the expression of p-GSK-3β and GSK-3β, but stimulated the β-catenin expression and downstream genes of wnt/β-catenin including cyclin D1 and C-myc. Our data demonstrated for the first time that upregulated salusin-β may be a novel independent prognostic biomarker for overall survival of ovarian cancer. Salusin-β accelerated the proliferation and epithelial mesenchymal transition of ovarian cancer cells at least partly via activation of Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway. Salusin-β may be an important target for therapeutic intervention in ovarian cancer.