Huge yolk sac tumor in an adolescent girl: a case report

Germ cell tumours form a minority of all malignancies of the ovary. The common age group affected by yolk sac tumours is 11 to 24 years. Here, we present a case of yolk sac tumour in a 13-year-old girl who came with complaints of abdominal pain, distension and acute febrile illness. Fertility sparing surgery (Unilateral salpingo-oophorectomy) was done while the contra lateral ovary and uterus was conserved followed by combination chemotherapy postoperatively. As pprognosis of yolk sac tumours is highly stage-dependent, an early diagnosis can result in a drastic difference in the final outcome of the treatment of this highly aggressive disease. Besides the rarity of the tumour, the importance of the fact, that a vigilant and informed clinician can make an early and timely diagnosis of this condition even in girls of such a young age and make a drastic difference in the final outcome of the treatment, compels us to present this case

TGFβ Drives Metabolic Perturbations during Epithelial Mesenchymal Transition in Pancreatic Cancer: TGFβ Induced EMT in PDAC.

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is a highly lethal malignancy wherein a majority of patients present metastatic disease at diagnosis. Although the role of epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT), mediated by transforming growth factor beta (TGFβ), in imparting an aggressive phenotype to PDAC is well documented, the underlying biochemical pathway perturbations driving this behaviour have not been elucidated. We used high-resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) based molecular phenotyping approach in order to delineate metabolic changes concomitant to TGFβ-induced EMT in pancreatic cancer cells. Strikingly, we observed robust changes in amino acid and energy metabolism that may contribute to tumor invasion and metastasis. Somewhat unexpectedly, TGFβ treatment resulted in an increase in intracellular levels of retinoic acid (RA) that in turn resulted in increased levels of extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins including fibronectin (FN) and collagen (COL1). These findings were further validated in plasma samples obtained from patients with resectable pancreatic cancer. Taken together, these observations provide novel insights into small molecule dysregulation that triggers a molecular cascade resulting in increased EMT-like changes in pancreatic cancer cells, a paradigm that can be potentially targeted for better clinical outcomes