Key Laboratory of Reproductive Medicine, School of Public Health, Institute of Toxicology, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210029, China/Department of Urology, Huai-An First Affiliated Hospital, Nanjing Medical University, Huai-An, Jiangsu 21
2.
Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Cancer Biomarkers, Prevention & Treatment, Cancer Center, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210029, China/Department of Molecular & Genetic Toxicology, School of Public Health, Cancer Center, Nanjing Medical University
3.
Department of Urology, the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210029, China
4.
Key Laboratory of Reproductive Medicine, School of Public Health, Institute of Toxicology, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210029, China
Funds:
This study was partly supported by National Natural Science Foun-dation of China (No. 30872084 and No. 30972444), the Key Program for Basic Research of Jiangsu Provincial Department of Education (No. 08KJA330001) and "Qinglan Project" Foundation for the Y
Caspase-8 (CASP8) plays a key role in apoptosis. We examined by genotyping whether the -652 six-nucleotide insertion-deletion (6N ins/del) polymorphism in the CASP8 promoter region associated with prostate cancer risk in a hospital-based cohort of 406 Chinese prostate cancer patients and 408 age-matched cancer-free controls. Additionally,23 prostate cancer tissues were analyzed for CASP8 mRNA expression. We found a significantly decreased prostate cancer risk for the 6N ins/del genotype [adjusted odds ratio (OR)=0.68; 95% confidence interval (CI)=0.51-0.92] and del/del genotype (OR=0.34; 95% CI=0.19-0.63) compared with the ins/ins genotype. The 6N del allele was associated dose-dependently with decreased prostate cancer risk (Ptrend = 0.001). RT-PCR showed that individuals with the 6N del allele had lower CASP8 mRNA levels than those with the ins/ins genotype (P =0.024). These findings suggested that the CASP8 -652 6N ins/del polymorphism may affect the susceptibility to prostate cancer and reduce prostate cancer risk among Chinese men.