Frequency of an Allele for Low Activity of α-l-Fucosidase in Sera: Possible Increase in Epithelial Ovarian Cancer Patients23

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Abstract
Sera from a group of patients with ovarian cancer had a statistically significant deficiency of α-l-fucosidase activity compared with sera from healthy females or female patients with cervical or breast cancer. Mixing experiments did not identify an inhibitor of α-l-fucosidase activity in the sera of ovarian cancer patients. Decreased activity of α-l-fucosidase was not associated with stage of disease, tumor burden, histologic type, or grade of differentiation. Unlike α-l-fucosidase, β-mannosidase and β-N-acetylglucosaminidase in sera of ovarian cancer patients were not deficient in activity. Examination of population data of healthy females and of pedigrees of ovarian cancer patients suggested that the quantitative activity of α-l-fucosidase in serum was genetically determined. Of 60 healthy females, 4 had low enzyme activity (l275 U/ml), whereas of 44 ovarian cancer patients, 11 had low, 29 had intermediate, and 4 had high activity. Application of the Hardy-Weinberg law to these data revealed that low enzyme activity in sera was three times more prevalent in the ovarian cancer group, the allele for this low enzyme activity being two times more common. These observations suggested that deficiency of α-l-fucosidase activity in sera of females may be a hereditary condition associated with increased risk for development of ovarian cancer.