Description
Alkaline phosphatase, placental-like 2 (ALPPL2 or ALPG) is a (GPI)-anchored membrane protein and a member of the human alkaline phosphatase family. Not expressed in normal tissue except for the trophoblast, ALPPL2 exhibits a rare tumor specificity with immunohistochemistry (IHC) on tumor tissue arrays revealing its expression in 43% of mesotheliomas, 60% of ovarian cancers, 36% of pancreatic cancers, 18% of gastric cancers, and 100% of seminomas. Furthermore, expression of ALPPL2 was significantly increased in gastric adenocarcinoma (P?<?0.01), while RNA interference-mediated ALPPL-2 knockdown identified novel tumor-associated functions in pancreatic cancer cell growth and invasion. Not only is ALPPL2 suited for therapy development against ALPPL2-expressing tumors, but it has also been identified as a prominent naive-specific surface marker for pluripotency-essential for both the establishment and maintenance of naïve pluripotency