In gene expression profiling,nasopharyngeal carcinoma(NPC)5-8F cells differ from 6-10Bcells in terms of their high tumorigenicity and metastatic ability.Differentially expressed genes from the twocell types were analyzed by combining with MILANO(the automatic custom annotation of microarray resultswhich is based on all the available published work in PubMed).The results showed that five genes,includingCTSD,P63,CSE1L,BPAG1 and EGR1,have been studied or mentioned in published work on NPC.Subsequently,we revaluated the roles of these genes in the pathogenesis of NPC by combining the data ofgene chips from NPCs versus NPs and pooled cells from 5-8F,6-10B and CNE2 versus NPs.The resultssuggested that the roles of BPAG1 and EGR1 are possibly different from those reported in previous NPCstudies.These five genes are likely to be involved in the proliferation,apoptosis,invasion and metastasis ofNPC.A reexploration of the genes will further define their roles in the pathogenesis of NPC. In gene expression profiling, nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) 5-8F cells differ from 6-10 Cells in terms of their high tumorigenicity and metastatic ability. Differentially expressed genes from the twocell types were analyzed by combining with MILANO (the automatic custom annotation of microarray resultswhich is based on all the available published work in PubMed). The results showed that five genes, including CTSD, P63, CSE1L, BPAG1 and EGR1, have been studied or mentioned in published work on NPC. Published, we revaluated the roles of these genes in the pathogenesis of NPC by combining the data ofgene chips from NPCs versus NPs and pooled cells from 5-8F, 6-10B and CNE2 versus NPs.The resultssuggested that the roles of BPAG1 and EGR1 are potentially different from those reported in previous NPCstudies.These five genes are likely to be involved in the proliferation, apoptosis, invasion and metastasis ofNPC. A reexploration of the genes will further define their roles in the pathogenesis of NPC.