Abstract
Background: NKx3-1 is a prostatic tumor suppressor gene located on chromosome 8p, AMACR is an enzyme characterized by investigators studying lipid metabolism. This study aimed to detect the expression of NKx3-1 and AMACR in prostatic adenocarcinoma patients and to correlate their expression with different tumor grade and patients’ age.
A total of Fifty-four archival tissue blocks previously diagnosed as prostatic adenocarcinoma were collected. Immunohistochemistry was performed on tissue section slides to detect the expression of NKx3-1 as diagnostic marker and AMACR in the prostatic adenocarcinoma.
Results:
Sections were stained with hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) and were graded into 5 grades according to Gleason score to study the relation between the expressions of NKx3-1 and AMACR with tumor grade. The most expressed of NKx3-1 in grade 4, then 5, 3, 2 and 1, AMACR expression did not correlate with prostatic adenocarcinoma but it correlates with tumor grade and patient age, it was found that the expression of AMACR was more highly expressed in age group more than 80 years old.
Conclusions:
The assertion indicates a discrepancy between AMACR's absence of correlation with pathological changes and its relationship with tumour grade and age.
According to the obtained results, we concluded that NKx3-1immunoexpression in prostatic adenocarcinoma correlate with pathological alterations in prostatic cancer was 23(42.6%) and the expression was higher among the high tumor grade 4, while AMACR immunoexpression in prostatic adenocarcinoma does not correlate with pathological alterations in prostatic cancer.

Key words: AMACR, NKx3-1, prostatic adenocarcinoma, tumor grades, patients age, pathological alterations