Moreover, the high levels of the pluripotency regulator Oct4 and as a consequence of Oct4 expression high levels of miR-17/106b seed family and pro-apoptotic Noxa and the low levels of cytoplasmic p21 (WAF1/Cip1) appear to be causative for the exquisite sensitivity to cisplatin-based therapy of testicular cancer.
We provide evidence for the fetal origin of testicular cancer as we detected strong expression of NANOG in fetal gonocytes up to gestational week 20, with subsequent down-regulation occurring earlier than for OCT-4.