The study measured the amount of the kisspeptin gene (KiSS‑1) and its receptor GPR54 in ovarian tissue samples. KiSS‑1 was higher in cancerous and borderline tumors and rose with later stage and lymph‑node spread, while GPR54 levels were similar across normal, benign, and cancerous tissues. The authors suggest KiSS‑1 may help suppress early tumor invasion, but no treatment was tested.

To study the expression and significance of metastasis suppressor gene KiSS-1 and its receptor GPR54 in epithelial ovarian cancer. The expression and their clinical significance of KiSS-1 and GPR54 were evaluated by RT-PCR in 37 patients with epithelial ovarian cancer, 15 patients with borderline epithelial ovarian tumors, 15 patients with epithelial benign tumors and 11 patients with normal ovarian tissues. The positivity and relative contents of KiSS-1 mRNA in patients with epithelial ovarian cancer (68%, 0.82 +/- 0.09) and borderline epithelial ovarian tumors (60%, 0.80 +/- 0.10) were all higher than in patients with epithelial benign tumor (20%, 0.65 +/- 0.10) and normal ovarian tissues (18%, 0.66 +/- 0.06; P < 0.05). The positivity and relative contents of KiSS-1 mRNA in patients with epithelial ovarian cancer correlated with their clinical stage and lymph node metastasis (P < 0.05). There was no difference in the positivity and relative contents of GPR54 mRNA between patients with epithelial ovarian cancer (70%, 0.79 +/- 0.07), borderline epithelial ovarian tumor (67%, 0.76 +/- 0.10), benign epithelial ovarian tumor (60%, 0.73 +/- 0.07) and normal ovarian tissues (45%, 0.78 +/- 0.08), respectively (all P > 0.05). The positivity and relative contents of GPR54 mRNA in patients with epithelial ovarian cancer did not correlate with their clinical stage, histology grade, lymph node metastasis and production of ascites (P > 0.05). KiSS-1 and GPR54 may play an important role in inhibiting the invasion and metastasis of early epithelial ovarian cancer.