Objective: To investigate epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and thymidylate synthase (TS) expression in primary liver cancer, and analyze its clinicopathological features and prognostic significance. Methods: Immunohistochemistry was performed using EnVision method to detect EGFR and TS expression in 41 cases of liver cancer. Correlation coefficient between EGFR and TS was calculated by Spearman method. Fisher's exact probability method or χ² test was used to analyze the clinicopathological features of EGFR and TS. Kaplan-Meier method was used to calculate the survival rate of patients in conjunction with the log-rank test.COX proportional hazard regression model was used to analyze the prognostic factors of patients. ROC curve was used to analyze the predictive accuracy of EGFR and TS for prognosis. Results: The positive rates of EGFR and TS in liver cancer tissues were 34.15% and 39.02%, respectively. There was a positive correlation between EGFR and TS expressions, and the difference was statistically significant (P < 0.05). EGFR was associated with tumor size and tissue differentiation (P < 0.05) in HCC patients, whereas TS was associated with tissue differentiation (P < 0.05). There was no significant difference in prognostic effect of EGFR on survival rate (P > 0.05). TS prognostic effect on survival rate was statistically significant (P < 0.05). HR of EGFR was 0.210 with 95% CI, 0.052-0.852, P = 0.029; indicating that the risk of death in patients with negative EGFR was 0.210 times higher than that in patients with positive EGFR. HR of TS was 2.496, with 95% CI, 1.325-4.701, P = 0.005, indicating that the risk of death increased by 2.496 times with the same level of EGFR. The area under the EGFR curve was 0.553 and its approximate reference confidence interval was 95% (0.355, 0.751), indicating that EGFR was a risk factor for death and the area under the TS curve was 0.695, and its approximate reference confidence interval was 95% (0.513, 0.878), indicating that TS was a risk factor for death. Conclusion EGFR and TS were equally expressed in primary liver cancer, and EGFR and TS expressions were positively correlated. EGFR and TS had an effect on the degree of tissue differentiation in patients with liver cancer. EGFR and TS were risk factors for prognosis, and TS may assist EGFR.

Objective To investigate the expressions of acid sensing ion channel 1a(ASIC1a) and activator protein-1 (AP-1) in hepatocellular carcinoma,and to analyze the relationship between expressions and clinical features.Methods At the transcription level,expression spectroscopy chips and bioinformatics were used to analyze the changes of signal pathways before and after ASICla interference in hepatocellular carcinoma cells.63 cases of HCC and 42 cases of tumor adjacent tissue samples were chosen from the Third People's Hospital of Wuxi,between January 2010 and December 2014.Immunohistochemical staining was utilized to detect the expressions of ASIC1 a,c-Jun,c-Fos.The relationships among the three were analyzed by the nonparametric Spearman rank correlation coefficient.Results After ASIC1a inhibition,the expression of AP-1 (c-Jun and c-Fox) decreased significantly.The expressions of c-Jun and c-Fox were greatly decreased in interference group compared with control group.The positive rates of ASIC1a,c-Jun and c-Fos in HCC tissues were significantly higher than that of the adjacent tissues,68.3％ vs.19.0％,55.6％ vs.11.9％,47.6％ vs.11.7％ (P ＜ 0.05).Correlation analysis showed that the expression of ASIC1a was positively correlated with c-Jun and c-Fos expression (r =0.404,0.309,P ＜ 0.05).The expressions of ASIC 1 a,c-Jun and c-Fos were not related to age,tumor diameter and gender (P ＞ 0.05),which were related to the clinical stage,AFP and lymph node metastasis of the tumor (P ＜ 0.05).Conclusion ASIC1a may.affect the development of hepatocellular carcinoma through the downstream gene AP-1.