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University of Foggia (Italy)

Name of the research project:

Research of molecular markers of the oral cavity cancer in

biological fluids, such as blood and saliva, for the purpose

of early diagnosis and prognosis.

Project Leader (Mentor): Dr. Giannatempo Giovanni

Description of the project:

The squamous cell carcinoma is the most frequent malignant

tumor of the oral cavity (1,2). It is the eighth malignancy for the

man and is characterized by a low survival rate, mainly due to

the advanced stage at diagnosis and to the high frequency of

relapses and/or metastases.

After the surgery and/or radiotherapy, recurrences or metastases

occur in more than 50% of patients (80% of cases within 2 years)

and today the overall survival at 5 years of the patients with OSCC

is less to 50%. If the OSCC is diagnosed at an early stage, the 5-year

survival rises to 80 to 90% and costs of therapeutic services are

significantly reduced. Unfortunately, today in the majority of cases

the diagnosis is made in advanced stage (3). The development of

screening tests and/or diagnostic tests more specific and sensitive

result will give a significant improvement.

The use of saliva as a diagnostic matrix and application of the

latest techniques such as proteomics and genomics have the

potential to meet this demand.

Proteomics is particularly suitable for non-invasive investigation

of biological fluids such as the urine in renal cancer (RC), as it can

identify diseases related to particular changes or specific protein

biomarkers in different pathological processes.

In recent years there has been a growing interest in saliva as a

diagnostic fluid (4,5,6), due to its relatively simple and minimally

invasive collection. The collection of saliva may also be the only

practical way of doing screening of a large number of patients as

it is not invasive, it is easy, inexpensive, convenient and reduces

the risk of cross-infection, which characterize the tests on blood/

serum. In this project, we aim to analyze and identify the salivary

proteome profile of patients with oral cancer in order to identify

specific biomarkers useful for discriminating patients with OSCC

from healthy patients.

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In the post-genomic era, the identification of biomarkers can

be made at protein level using proteomics. The pattern of some

expression changes between the biomarkers may be useful for

the early detection of OSCC or identification of patients at high-

est risk of developing metastases or recurrences.

One of the most promising tools for proteomic discoveries

of new biomarkers is the surface-enhanced laser desorption/

ionization (SELDI) mass spectrometry (MS)-based ProteinChip

technology.

The great potential of proteomic technologies such as SELDI-

TOF-MS will be critical for the successful completion of the

project, and may allow the identification of potential biomarkers

for cancer OSSC.

A recent study used the SELDI-TOF to identify possible markers

of breast cancer in saliva (7). The study suggested that saliva

may be useful for the discovery of early biomarkers of recur-

rence of breast cancer. Considering studies on proteomic pro-

files of Hu et al. (8), Huang (9), and Vitorino et al. (10) using 2D

gels and mass spectrometry that showed the presence of 309

salivary proteins in whole saliva, the use of SELDI can potentially

be used to restrict the profile of the spectrum to identify protein

biomarker significant suitable for further validation (7). This can

facilitate the process of exploration of the salivary biomarkers.

This project will employ the latest technologies at the time

to undertake a systematic determination of the profile of the

expression pattern of proteins in patients with OSCC in order to

identify novel biomarkers in saliva for the development of highly

productive screening that will be useful for diagnostic purposes

trials (11).

The project should lead us to identify a revolutionary set of sali-

vary biomarkers for non-invasive diagnostic OSCC. At the same

time, the project may add additional knowledge to carcinogenesis

pathway, the identification of new genes and related proteins,

also allowing the identification of a data set of salivary mRNA and

protein, useful for the identification of susceptibility or individual

natural history of tumors with more aggressive or metastatic, and

certainly for the early detection of oral cancer.

The study will be endorsed by Dr. Giovanni Giannatempo and the

staff of Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine of the

University of Foggia with the collaboration of Dr. pathologist Lucia

M. Gonzalez Lopez in the Hospital General Universitario de Ciudad

Real.

What will be the student’s involvement within the research

project?

Students will help for selecting patients and analizing saliva

samples acquired from them.

What practical skills and knowledge would the student

acquire during the research project?

Skills and knowledge about the using of special machine

“Seldi Tof” that is present in italy only in the Department of

Sperimental and clinical Medicine - University of Foggia

Improvement on the knowledge of genomic and pro-

teomics, on variations in presence of cancerous and pre

cancerous lesions.

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Is there any special knowledge, skills or certain level of

studies required?

Successful examination of oral pathology and pathologi-

cal anatomy, and in the case of medical students, also

have passed the examination of Dentistry

Language(s) of use: Italian / english /spanish

Minimum number of weeks to participate: 4 weeks

Hours of work per day: 6

Available months: October, November, December

Students to be accepted: 6 - 10

Contact:

Victor Luca Palumbo

IADS National Scientific Officer

email address: victorspalumbo@gmail.com

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Selection Process

The students have to submit the complete applica-

tion to the IADS National/Local Scientific Officers or

the Project Leader (Mentor). The University receives

the applications and has the option to select the

students who better fit the scientific project.

a) A complete application consists of:

1) Curriculum Vitae in English

2) A letter of intent ( a short description of the scien-

tific activities should be attached)

3) Two letters of recommendation

4) Copies of Medical Certificates and Awards.

The application materials should be written or trans-

lated in English.

Logistics

- The Program/network consists of Universities offer-

ing dental research internships to international stu-

dents who are rigurously selected by the University.

- A team of IADS National/Local Scientific Officers are

in charge of successfully implementing and assuring

the continuity of the Program.

- The Universities have the full right of selecting the

students who better fit the dental research internship

- The student is involved in a dental research intern-

ship for a period of time ranging from 2 to 8 weeks,

and at the completion of the internship it is granted

with a Certificate of Participation in the IDRP research

internship.