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High Prevalence of RET/PTC Rearrangements in Ukrainian and Belarussian Post-Chernobyl Thyroid Papillary Carcinomas: A Strong Correlation between RET/PTC3 and the Solid-Follicular Variant¹

Thyroid Carcinogenesis Group, University of Cambridge, Strangeways Research Laboratory (G.A.T., H.B., H.A.C., E.D.W.), Cambridge, United Kingdom CB1 8RN; the Institute of Pathology, Minsk State Medical Institute (A.N., E.D.C.), Minsk 220600, Belarus; the Institute of Endocrinology and Metabolism (N.D.T., T.I.B.), Kiev 254114, Ukraine; the Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori di Napoli, Fondazione Senatore Pascale (G.C., G.V., F.P.), Naples 80131, Italy; Centro di Endocrinologia ed Oncologia Sperimentale del Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche c/o Dipartimento di Biologia e Patologia Cellulare e Molecolare, Università di Napoli Federico II (G.S., M.S., G.V.), Naples 80131, Italy; and the Dipartimento di Medicina Sperimentale e Clinica, Università di Catanzaro (A.F.), Catanzaro 88100, Italy

Address all correspondence and requests for reprints to: Dr. Massimo Santoro, Centro di Endocrinologia ed Oncologia Sperimentale del Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Universita’ degli Studi di Napoli, Via S. Pansini 5, 80131 Naples, Italy. E-mail: masantor{at}unina.it

A sharp increase in the incidence of pediatric thyroid papillary cancer was documented after the Chernobyl power plant explosion. An increased prevalence of rearrangements of the RET protooncogene (RET/PTC rearrangements) has been reported in Belarussian post-Chernobyl papillary carcinomas arising between 1990 and 1995. We analyzed 67 post-Chernobyl pediatric papillary carcinomas arising in 1995–1997 for RET/PTC activation: 28 were from Ukraine and 39 were from Belarus. The study, conducted by a combined immunohistochemistry and RT-PCR approach, demonstrated a high frequency (60.7% of the Ukrainian and 51.3% of the Belarussian cases) of RET/PTC activation. A strong correlation was observed between the solid-follicular subtype of papillary carcinoma and the RET/PTC3 isoform: 19 of the 24 RET/PTC-positive solid-follicular carcinomas harbored a RET/PTC3 rearrangement, whereas only 5 had a RET/PTC1 rearrangement. Taken together these results support the concept that RET/PTC activation plays a central role in the pathogenesis of thyroid papillary carcinomas in both Ukraine and Belarus after the Chernobyl accident.

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