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Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Aug 14, 2016; 22(30): 6800-6816
Published online Aug 14, 2016. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v22.i30.6800
Hepatitis-related hepatocellular carcinoma: Insights into cytokine gene polymorphisms
Mahmoud Fathy Dondeti, Eman Anwar El-Maadawy, Roba Mohamed Talaat
Mahmoud Fathy Dondeti, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology Research Division, National Research Centre, Dokki, Cairo 11435, Egypt
Eman Anwar El-Maadawy, Roba Mohamed Talaat, Molecular Biology Department, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology Research Institute, University of Sadat City, Sadat City 21547, Egypt
Author contributions: All authors have equally contributed to this paper with conception, literature review, drafting and critical revision and editing, and final approval of the final version.
Conflict-of-interest statement: No potential conflicts of interest and No financial support.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Roba Mohamed Talaat, Assiatant Professor, Molecular Immunology, Molecular Biology Department, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology Research Institute, University of Sadat City, Sadat City 21547, Egypt. roba.talaat@gebri.usc.edu.eg
Telephone: +20-48-2601264 Fax: +20-48-2601266
Received: March 28, 2016
Peer-review started: March 31, 2016
First decision: May 12, 2016
Revised: June 11, 2016
Accepted: July 6, 2016
Article in press: July 6, 2016
Published online: August 14, 2016
Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a primary liver cancer, which is one of the most prevalent cancers among humans. Many factors are involved in the liver carcinogenesis as lifestyle and environmental factors. Hepatitis virus infections are now recognized as the chief etiology of HCC; however, the precise mechanism is still enigmatic till now. The inflammation triggered by the cytokine-mediated immune response, was reported to be the closest factor of HCC development. Cytokines are immunoregulatory proteins produced by immune cells, functioning as orchestrators of the immune response. Genes of cytokines and their receptors are known to be polymorphic, which give rise to variations in their genes. These variations have a great impact on the expression levels of the secreted cytokines. Therefore, cytokine gene polymorphisms are involved in the molecular mechanisms of several diseases. This piece of work aims to shed much light on the role of cytokine gene polymorphisms as genetic host factor in hepatitis related HCC.

Keywords: Hepatocellular carcinoma, Hepatitis C virus, Hepatitis B virus, Cytokines, Polymorphism

Core tip: Cytokines have a decisive role in the pathophysiology of many infectious, autoimmune and malignant diseases. Changes in cytokine secretion profile are involved in one way or another in susceptibility to hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and eventualy are thought to influence the disease phenotype and the rapid progression to HCC. Individual variation in cytokine profile might, at least partially, to genetic alteration within the regulatory regions of cytokine genes. One of the most studied phenomena is the allelic polymorphism and its implication in cytokine gene expression, and the susceptibility to infection, clinical severity of diseases and response to treatment. This review concentrates on the cytokine gene polymorphism case-control and meta-analysis studies performed all over the world on hepatocellular carcinoma patients (as a consequence to HBV or HCV infection).