Merck, MABT395, Anti-Muc4 Antibody, clone 8G7

Mucin-4 (MUC-4 or Muc4) is also called Ascites sialoglycoprotein (ASGP), Pancreatic adenocarcinoma mucin, Testis mucin, and Tracheobronchial mucin. Muc4 is proteolytically cleaved into two chains: mucin-4 alpha chain and mucin-4 beta chain. Muc4 has anti-adhesive properties and is involved in tumor progression, cell proliferation and differentiation of epithelial cells. Muc4 is expressed in the thymus, thyroid, lung, trachea, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, colon, testis, prostate, ovary, uterus, placenta, mammary and salivary glands as well as lung cancers, squamous cell carcinomas of the upper aerodigestive tract, mammary carcinomas, biliary tract, colon, cervix cancers, pancreatic tumors, and pancreatic tumor cell lines. The expression of Muc4 has become a very useful indicator of poor prognosis in patients with invasive ductal carcinoma and intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, mass forming type (IDC,ICC-MF), where patients with high Muc4 expression had lower survival rates than those with low Muc4 expression.