Saptaparna Dasgupta, Bennett University
According to reported statistics, cervical cancer stands to be the fourth most frequent cancer amongst women all over the world. Human papillomavirus (HPV) acts as the devastating toxic agent that drives cervical cancer.
A study conducted in Tehran University of Medical Sciences involved five different variants of HPV amongst Iranian women affected with cervical cancer. Data based on regional variants of different kinds of HPV are of considerable significance. The study aims at examining sequencing variation between normal, premalignant, and malignant samples of the E6 genes and long control region of HPV 39. It stands to be crucial for the identification of the prevalent circulating HPV 39 variants in Tehran, Iran.
HPV and its types:
Human papillomavirus serves as a toxic agent and induces cervical cancer in human females. HPV has 40 different types that can affect the anogenital tract, amongst which, 14 of the types are regarded as high-risk HPV. The high-risk HPV are linked and associated with the progression to deadly cervical cancer. Further analysis of patients with cervical cancer, the most common five HPV types were revealed as HPV 16, 18, 31, 39 and 45. HPV 39, accounts for 3.3% of cervical cancer amongst Iranian women.
Analysis of HPV 39:
The types of Human Papillomavirus are categorized on the basis of the DNA sequence of the L1 gene, which had to be different from the other characterized DNA by at least 10%. It was reported that HPV 39 possesses two different lineages, namely A and B. Further, lineage A is divided into two distinct sublineages, namely A1 and A2. With respect to the regional variants of the various types of HPV, the high scope is observed in aspects of future studies on the evolutionary, pathological, and biological strategies. Studies on HPV 39 reveal the importance of the E6 gene, which has been proven to separate out both the lineages from this variant. Also, the long control region was observed to be responsible for the separation of both the distinct sublineages A1 and A2.
The study:
Cross-sectional research was conceived from 2018 to 2020 to characterize lineages and sublineages of HPV 39. The samples were embedded with 156 formalin-fixed paraffin (FFPE) and were obtained from Immam-Khomeini hospital in Tehran. Its DNA extraction was isolated using the phenol-chloroform assay. Along with it, 55 pre-genotyped ThinPrep Pap specimen samples were collected from HPV 39 positive patients from other laboratories. Further, DNA was extracted using the High Pure Viral Nucleic Acid Kit. The method of detection was based on nested PCR. The HPV-positive samples were tested by subjecting the samples to sequences using an automated genetic analyzer. The sequences were blasted into the genome database (Fig 1).
Fig 1. The process overview of the study conducted with the samples of Iranian women suffering from cervical cancer. Created with BioRender.com
Notable observations from the study:
Analysis of the samples (Table 1) revealed some positions for the substitution of nucleotides, namely G78T, G171T, C260G, T305C, and A453G. These locations were observed to be specific for lineage B of HPV 39. The partial sequence of LCR was also studied to differentiate sublineages A1 and A2 from each other. Moreover, analysis of the phylogenetic tree revealed approximately 98.6% of the sequences were classified under A1 and only 1.4% belonged to A2. In this aspect, however, the groups tested did not identify statistically significant differences.
Table 1. Representation of the data obtained after analysis of the obtained results.
Due to the development related to ethnicity, the distribution of HPV 16 and 18 variants may be regionally diverse. However, the study examined the sequence variation of the E6 gene and LCR in HPV 39 to determine the frequencies of HPV 39 in ordinary samples and the premalignant and malignant lesions in Iranian women’s cervix. A connection between population-based HPV 39 variants oncogenicity and genetic modifications might be expected, particularly HLA Class I and HLA Class II alleles. There is some research in certain geographic areas of the world which match the results. For three unique alleles in Japanese women, also a notable connection was discovered between the various E6 variants of HPV16 and HLA class II alleles. The small sample size and numerous infections were the most major drawbacks of this study.
Importance of the Findings:
Lineages A, sublineage A1, were seen as dominant in Tehran, Iran. Findings indicated Important data were produced for HPV variants that might assist in better understanding of the molecular carcinogenicity of various HPV types. However, the most notable limitations of this study were the few samples and numerous infections. In order to evaluate the risk of pathogenicity in HPV 39, further research with the larger sample size of a single HPV 39 infection from different geographical locations in Iran is required.
Also read: Novel Computational Method to Identify Cyclin Proteins
Reference:
- Hosseini, N., Shoja, Z., Arashkia, A., Khodadadi, A.-H., & Jalilvand, S. (2021). Lineage analysis of human papillomavirus type 39 in cervical samples of Iranian women. Virology Journal, 18(1), 152. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12985-021-01619-8
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Author info:
Saptaparna Dasgupta, currently a B. Tech 3rd-year student, pursuing Biotechnology, is a diligent student and determined in terms of her career goals. Being a budding biotechnologist, she is open to all research fields of her course and passionate about knowledge. She is focused and constantly tries to improve her writing skills, also a project enthusiast and is fond of gaining hands-on experience in laboratories. She believes that all hard work and efforts pays off eventually and follows this as the motto of her life. Check out some of her works on:
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