Amplification of 3q26 is one of the most frequent chromosomal alterations in many solid
tumors, including ovarian, lung, esophageal, prostate, breast, and
nasopharyngeal cancers. A candidate oncogene to eukaryotic
initiation factor 5A2 (eIF-5A2), a member of eukaryotic
initiation factor 5A subfamily, has been isolated from a frequently amplified region at 3q26.2. In this work, the tumorigenic ability of
eIF-5A2 was demonstrated by anchorage-independent growth in soft
agar and
tumor formation in nude mice. Furthermore,
antisense DNA against
eIF-5A2 could inhibit cell growth in
ovarian cancer cell line UACC-1598 with amplification of
eIF-5A2 in form of double minutes. Cell growth rate in UACC-1598 was also inhibited when the expression level of
EIF-5A2 was decreased by the reduction of the copy number of double minutes. The correlation of
EIF-5A2 overexpression and clinical features of
ovarian cancer was investigated using tissue microarray, and the result showed that
eIF-5A2 overexpression was significantly associated with the advanced stage of
ovarian cancer. These findings suggest that
eIF-5A2 plays important roles in ovarian pathogenesis.