Background
Discrimination between benign and malignant tumors is a challenging process in pediatric adrenocortical tumors. New insights in the metabolic profile of pediatric adrenocortical tumors may contribute to this distinction, predict prognosis, as well as identify new molecular targets for therapy. The
Conclusion
GLUT1 expression was differentially expressed in pediatric adrenocortical tumors, with higher expression in clinically malignant tumors, and associated with shorter survival, suggesting a metabolic remodeling towards a hyperglycolytic phenotype in this malignancy.
Methods
A total of 50 pediatric patients presenting adrenocortical tumors, including 41 clinically benign and 9 clinically malignant tumors, were included. Protein expression was evaluated using immunohistochemistry in samples arranged in tissue microarrays.
Results
The immunohistochemical analysis showed a significant increase in plasma membrane expression of GLUT1 in malignant lesions, when compared to benign lesions (p=0.004), being the expression of this protein associated with shorter overall and disease-free survival (p=0.004 and p=0.001, respectively). Although significant differences were not observed for proteins other than GLUT1, MCT1, MCT4 and CD147 were highly expressed in pediatric adrenocortical neoplasias (around 90%).