Basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) has been shown to be a potent mitogen for a variety of cell types including colonic epithelial cells. Basic FGF has also been reported to have angiogenic activity. Thus, it has been proposed that bFGF expression might correlate with invasiveness and prognosis in human carcinomas. In the present study, bFGF expression has been evaluated in samples from 44 patients with large bowel carcinoma. Samples from the tumours and corresponding normal mucosae were collected at the time of surgery and frozen sections evaluated using a chick polyclonal antibody to bFGF and standard immunoperoxidase techniques. The expression of bFGF was significantly less within the tumours than in the corresponding normal mucosa (p<0.001). Five of the tumours were Dukes' stage A, 21 Dukes' stage B and 18 Dukes' stage C. Basic FGF expression tended to decrease with progression from Dukes' stage A to Dukes' stage C (p<0.05). This finding also paralleled loss of differentiation. Of the 44 patients, 8 have since died of their disease and only 3 of these had tumours which expressed bFGF. An attempt to correlate the expression of bFGF with that of another putative marker of colorectal disease progression, the cell-cell adhesion molecule E-cadherin, revealed no significant correlation.

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