Skip to main content
  • AACR Publications
    • Blood Cancer Discovery
    • Cancer Discovery
    • Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention
    • Cancer Immunology Research
    • Cancer Prevention Research
    • Cancer Research
    • Clinical Cancer Research
    • Molecular Cancer Research
    • Molecular Cancer Therapeutics

AACR logo

  • Register
  • Log in
  • My Cart
Advertisement

Main menu

  • Home
  • About
    • The Journal
    • AACR Journals
    • Subscriptions
    • Permissions and Reprints
    • Reviewing
  • Articles
    • OnlineFirst
    • Current Issue
    • Past Issues
    • Meeting Abstracts
    • Cancer Immunology Essentials
    • Collections
      • COVID-19 & Cancer Resource Center
      • "Best of" Collection
      • Editors' Picks
  • For Authors
    • Information for Authors
    • Author Services
    • Best of: Author Profiles
    • Submit
  • Alerts
    • Table of Contents
    • Editors' Picks
    • OnlineFirst
    • Citation
    • Author/Keyword
    • RSS Feeds
    • My Alert Summary & Preferences
  • News
    • Cancer Discovery News
  • COVID-19
  • Webinars
  • Search More

    Advanced Search

  • AACR Publications
    • Blood Cancer Discovery
    • Cancer Discovery
    • Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention
    • Cancer Immunology Research
    • Cancer Prevention Research
    • Cancer Research
    • Clinical Cancer Research
    • Molecular Cancer Research
    • Molecular Cancer Therapeutics

User menu

  • Register
  • Log in
  • My Cart

Search

  • Advanced search
Cancer Immunology Research
Cancer Immunology Research
  • Home
  • About
    • The Journal
    • AACR Journals
    • Subscriptions
    • Permissions and Reprints
    • Reviewing
  • Articles
    • OnlineFirst
    • Current Issue
    • Past Issues
    • Meeting Abstracts
    • Cancer Immunology Essentials
    • Collections
      • COVID-19 & Cancer Resource Center
      • "Best of" Collection
      • Editors' Picks
  • For Authors
    • Information for Authors
    • Author Services
    • Best of: Author Profiles
    • Submit
  • Alerts
    • Table of Contents
    • Editors' Picks
    • OnlineFirst
    • Citation
    • Author/Keyword
    • RSS Feeds
    • My Alert Summary & Preferences
  • News
    • Cancer Discovery News
  • COVID-19
  • Webinars
  • Search More

    Advanced Search

Monitoring the Immunological Response to Human Cancer

Characterization of NY-ESO-1 and SSX gene families

Yao-Tseng Chen
Yao-Tseng Chen
Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, NY
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
DOI:  Published January 2003
  • Article
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF
Loading

Abstract

Among tumor antigens identified to date, cancer/testis (CT) antigens are recognized as a group of highly attractive targets for cancer vaccines. CT antigens have highly restricted expression in normal tissues, predominantly in testis, and yet they are found to be expressed in a significant proportion of various human cancers. More than a dozen CT antigen genes or gene families have been defined, including the NY-ESO-1 family and the SSX family.

NY-ESO-1 was initially discovered by autologous SEREX screening of an esophageal cancer cDNA library. It belongs to a gene family that has three distinct members, NY-ESO-1 (ESO1), LAGE-1 (ESO2), and ESO3. All three genes are within a 200 kb stretch on chromosome Xq28, and two exact copies of the ESO1 gene are present in tandem, but in reverse orientation. All three genes are consisted of three exons, and the exon-intron organization is conserved. NY-ESO-1 and LAGE-1 are highly homologous (84% amino acid, 94% nucleotide homology), whereas ESO3 is more distant, <50% identity to the other two genes. Another major difference is in the expression of these genes: NY-ESO-1 and LAGE-1 are CT antigens, whereas ESO3 is ubiquitously expressed in somatic tissues.

Both NY-ESO-1 and LAGE-1 have been shown to generate more than one protein product. For NY-ESO-1, the primary open reading frame encodes a 180 amino acid product, and a second ORF encodes a 58 amino acid polypeptide. For LAGE-1, in addition to the 180 amino acid product, two proteins have been shown, one derived from a second ORF, and the other from the first ORF, but from an alternative spliced transcript. Significantly, all variant protein products derived from NY-ESO-1 and LAGE-1 have been shown to contain peptide epitopes recognized by CD8+ T cells from cancer patients in an HLA-restricted fashion. In comparison, antibody responses have only been demonstrated against the 180-residue NY-ESO-1 and LAGE-1, but not the variant products.

In addition to NY-ESO-1, another CT antigen that has been shown to elicit spontaneous humoral and cell-mediated immune responses in cancer patients is SSX. The SSX gene family is also located on the X chromosome, Xp11. We have now characterized 9 structurally complete genes in this family, SSX1-SSX9, and exact duplicates of the SSX2 gene also exist. All SSX genes are highly homologous at both nucleotide and DNA levels. Although none of the genes shows ubiquitous expression, the expression profile of different SSX genes do differ significantly. Among normal adult tissues tested, testis expresses SSX1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7, but not SSX6, 8, and 9. In tumor tissues, SSX1, 2, and 4 are most frequently expressed (approx. 20-30% range); in contrast, SSX3, 5, 6, and 7 are rarely expressed (<1%), and SSX 8 and SSX9 expression have not been detected.

This abstract was published in Cancer Immunity, a Cancer Research Institute journal that ceased publication in 2013 and is now provided online in association with Cancer Immunology Research.

  • Copyright © 2003 by Yao-Tseng Chen
PreviousNext
Back to top
Cancer Immunity Archive: 3 (Suppl 1)
January 2003
Volume 3, Issue Suppl 1
  • Table of Contents

Sign up for alerts

Open full page PDF
Article Alerts
Sign In to Email Alerts with your Email Address
Email Article

Thank you for sharing this Cancer Immunology Research article.

NOTE: We request your email address only to inform the recipient that it was you who recommended this article, and that it is not junk mail. We do not retain these email addresses.

Enter multiple addresses on separate lines or separate them with commas.
Characterization of NY-ESO-1 and SSX gene families
(Your Name) has forwarded a page to you from Cancer Immunology Research
(Your Name) thought you would be interested in this article in Cancer Immunology Research.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
Citation Tools
Characterization of NY-ESO-1 and SSX gene families
Yao-Tseng Chen
Cancer Immun January 1 2003 (3) (Suppl 1) 13;

Citation Manager Formats

  • BibTeX
  • Bookends
  • EasyBib
  • EndNote (tagged)
  • EndNote 8 (xml)
  • Medlars
  • Mendeley
  • Papers
  • RefWorks Tagged
  • Ref Manager
  • RIS
  • Zotero
Share
Characterization of NY-ESO-1 and SSX gene families
Yao-Tseng Chen
Cancer Immun January 1 2003 (3) (Suppl 1) 13;
del.icio.us logo Digg logo Reddit logo Twitter logo CiteULike logo Facebook logo Google logo Mendeley logo
  • Tweet Widget
  • Facebook Like
  • Google Plus One

Jump to section

  • Article
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF
Advertisement

Related Articles

Cited By...

More in this TOC Section

  • Immunological monitoring: Lessons from natural and vaccine-induced responses to Melan-A/MART-1
  • Monitoring of immune responses against NY-ESO-1 in cancer patients
  • Comprehensive approaches to monitor CD8+ T-cell responses against tumor antigen NY-ESO-1
Show more Monitoring the Immunological Response to Human Cancer
  • Home
  • Alerts
  • Feedback
  • Privacy Policy
Facebook   Twitter   LinkedIn   YouTube   RSS

Articles

  • Online First
  • Current Issue
  • Past Issues
  • Cancer Immunology Essentials

Info for

  • Authors
  • Subscribers
  • Advertisers
  • Librarians

About Cancer Immunology Research

  • About the Journal
  • Editorial Board
  • Permissions
  • Submit a Manuscript
AACR logo

Copyright © 2021 by the American Association for Cancer Research.

Cancer Immunology Research
eISSN: 2326-6074
ISSN: 2326-6066

Advertisement