Background/aims: Interleukin-10 (IL-10) plays an important role in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) immune evasion. However, the precise mechanism responsible for aberrant IL-10 production remains unknown. B7-H1 expression can predominantly stimulate IL-10 production and contributes to the tumor immune evasion. This study was designed to investigate the expression of B7-H1 and IL-10 in normal liver tissues and HCC samples, and further to evaluate the correlation between B7-H1 expression and IL-10 levels.
Methodology: We detected the B7-H1 and IL-10 expression in sixty HCC tissues and ten healthy liver tissues at mRNA and protein level using RT-PCR and immunohistochemical staining Western-blotting, respectively, and further analyzed the correlation between B7-H1 expression and IL-10 levels in HCC samples.
Results: The results showed that all HCC samples demonstrated the up-regulated expression of B7-H1 and IL-10 at mRNA and protein level compared with normal liver tissues and there was a significant correlation between B7-H1 expression and IL-10 levels (p<0.01).
Conclusion: These findings for the first time suggest the potential role of B7-H1 in promoting IL-10 production in HCC tissue, and implicate a new mechanism of HCC escape from immune surveillance.