Recently, dramatic overexpression of ecto-5'-nucleotidase (CD73), a glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored cell surface protein has been found in estrogen receptor-negative [ER (-)] breast cancer cell lines and in clinical samples.
The PAPcDNA probe did not recognize any specific mRNAs in RNAs extracted from human liver cancer, lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, placenta, breast cancer cells (MCF-7), mononuclear blood cells or acute promyelocytic leukemia cells (HL-60), according to Northern blot analysis. mRNA for PAP was detected in the androgen-dependent human prostatic cancer cell line LNCaP, but not in the androgen-insensitive human prostatic cancer cell line PC-3.