Germ cell tumors interference on spermatogenesis

• Grant number: 19/21877-4
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: August 01, 2020
• End date: July 31, 2022
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Medicine - Surgery
• Principal Investigator: Renato Fraietta
• Grantee: Renato Fraietta
• Host Institution: Escola Paulista de Medicina (EPM). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus São Paulo. São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Renata Cristina de Carvalho ; Ricardo Pimenta Bertolla ; Sergio C Oehninger

Abstract

Testicular Germ Cell Tumor (TGCTs) is the one that most affects men of reproductive age. There are two main subtypes of TGCTs, being they seminomatous and non-seminomatous; both originate in the germ cells, but the non-seminomatous ones have a more aggressive nature. It has been reported that the seminal quality of patients with TGCTs is affected. In addition, an earlier study performed by the Urology Research Center of the UNIFESP Urology Unit evaluated seminal samples of patients with TGCTs in the pre and post orchiectomy moments, in which some hyper express proteins were detected in the pre-group, being: GSHB, CD14, APOA1, B4GALT1 and GP2. Protein overexpression in the seminal plasma of patients with germ cell tumors detected at the time of pre-orchiectomy is related to the testis and may vary according to the seminomatous and non-seminomatous tumor subtypes interfering with spermatogenesis. To analyze by protein marking in the testicular tissue and histopathology the differences in both the expression of proteins and in the possible changes related to the organization of spermatogenesis between the seminomatous and non-seminomatous tumor subtypes. Testicular fragments from orchiectomy of the Department of Pathology of UNIFESP will be used. There will be three groups: control, group with seminomatous tumor pure and mixed non-seminomatous, without seminomatous components; the immunohistochemical technique will be applied to evaluate the expression of the proteins mentioned above, as well as histopathology of the seminiferous tubules, correlating with the nature of each tumor. (AU)