REVIEW: Cancer-Retina Antigens – A New Group of Tumor Antigens

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M. O. Golovastova^1,2*, A. V. Bazhin^1,3, and P. P. Philippov¹

¹Lomonosov Moscow State University, Belozersky Institute of Physico-Chemical Biology, 119991 Moscow, Russia

²Lomonosov Moscow State University, Faculty of Bioengineering and Bioinformatics, 119991 Moscow, Russia; fax: +7 (495) 939-3181; E-mail: golovastova@belozersky.msu.ru

³Department of General, Visceral, and Transplant Surgery, Ludwig-Maximilians-University, 81377 Munich, Germany; fax: +49 (89) 4400-76433; E-mail: alexandr.bazhin@med.uni-muenchen.de

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed.

Received April 8, 2014

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Some photoreceptor proteins normally specific for the eye retina are aberrantly expressed in malignant tumors. These proteins include recoverin, visual rhodopsin, transducin, cGMP-phosphodiesterase 6 (PDE 6), cGMP-dependent cationic channels, guanylyl cyclase 1, rhodopsin kinase, and arrestin. By analogy with cancer-testis antigens, these photoreceptor proteins form the group of cancer-retina antigens. It is shown that an aberrant demethylation of the promoter region of recoverin is involved in the aberrant expression of this protein. The cascade Wnt5a → Frizzled-2 → transducin → PDE 6 is shown to function in skin melanoma cells, and this suggests that these cancer-retina antigens can play a functional role. The events accompanying the signal transduction in this cascade, including those involving calcium ions and cGMP-dependent protein kinase (protein kinase G), are discussed.

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KEY WORDS: visual transduction, retina, cancer-retina antigens, aberrant expression, cancer

DOI: 10.1134/S000629791408001X

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