Brain Cancer Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Brain Cancer, including details on symptoms, benign and malignant tumors, gliomas, treatment.

Quantitative analysis of topoisomerase IIalpha to rapidly evaluate cell proliferation in brain tumors.

Oda M, Arakawa Y, Kano H, Kawabata Y, Katsuki T, Shirahata M, Ono M, Yamana N, Hashimoto N, Takahashi JA

Department of Neurosurgery, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8315, Japan.

Immunohistochemical cell proliferation analyses have come into wide use for evaluation of tumor malignancy. Topoisomerase IIalpha (topo IIalpha), an essential nuclear enzyme, has been known to have cell cycle coupled expression. We here show the usefulness of quantitative analysis of topo IIalpha mRNA to rapidly evaluate cell proliferation in brain tumors. A protocol to quantify topo IIalpha mRNA was developed with a real-time RT-PCR. It took only 3 h to quantify from a specimen. A total of 28 brain tumors were analyzed, and the level of topo IIalpha mRNA was significantly correlated with its immuno-staining index (p<0.0001, r=0.9077). Furthermore, it sharply detected that topo IIalpha mRNA decreased in growth-inhibited glioma cell. These results support that topo IIalpha mRNA may be a good and rapid indicator to evaluate cell proliferate potential in brain tumors.

Published 10 May 2005 in Biochem Biophys Res Commun, 331(4): 971-6.
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