A new strategy to evaluate emerging tumour-associated antigens as biomarkers of acute lymphocytic leukaemia development

Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) is the most common type of tumour in children aged from 1-14 years .Currently, diagnosis is made by bone marrow aspiration. For this reason, the present study aimed to find a new diagnostic method for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia based on the presence of specific biomarkers such as (α–enolase, P53, VDCI , and CIg) their ratios may reflect the tumor development status of patients. Eighty children with ALL were selected and compared with forty healthy children as control. The ages of ALL and normal cases ranged from 1 to 14 years. The serum levels of α–enolase, P53, VDAC1 and CIg were determined using ELISA method. The results showed a significant decrease in the levels of α–enolase, P53 and CIg in ALL patients (Mean ±SD 388.9062 ± 115.18294 pg/ml , 76.9207 ± 10.23092 pg/ml and 6.2747 ± 3.49786 μg/ml respectively) compared to the control cases (Mean ±SD 596.7733 ± 217.34848 pg/ml , 118.0352 ± 44.49135 pg/ml , 8.6873 ± 4.04248 μg/ml) respectively with p<0.05 , while VDAC1 showed not significant decreased. The study concluded that changes in the selected tumour antigens reflected the physiological changes in the tumour lymphocytes, which can be adopted as new indicators to follow the tumour development and response to chemotherapy.