title: Argininosuccinate synthetase gene expression in leukemias: potential diagnostic marker for blastic crisis of chronic myelocytic leukemia.
abstract: Argininosuccinate synthetase (ASS) activity is hardly detected in human lymphocytes. In this study, we examined the ASS gene expression of various leukemia cells by a polymerase-chain-reaction method. We demonstrate here that (a) acute lymphocytic and acute myelocytic leukemia cells exhibit the highly elevated expression of the ASS gene and (b) chronic myelocytic leukemia (CML) in blastic crisis also exhibits the increase of ASS gene expression while CML in chronic phase, chronic lymphocytic leukemia and adult T leukemia cells show the similar level to that of normal lymphocytes. These results suggest that the ASS gene expression is of value as a diagnostic marker of acute type leukemia, particularly for blastic crisis of CML.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Immunological Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ohno
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kimura
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sakurada
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sugimura
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Fujiyoshi
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Saheki
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sonoda
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Azuma
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001124:Argininosuccinate Synthase / Q000235:genetics*; D001752:Blast Crisis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D015971:Gene Expression Regulation, Enzymologic / Q000235:genetics*; D015973:Gene Expression Regulation, Leukemic / Q000235:genetics*; D005819:Genetic Markers; D006801:Humans; D007938:Leukemia / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D015451:Leukemia, Lymphocytic, Chronic, B-Cell / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D015464:Leukemia, Myelogenous, Chronic, BCR-ABL Positive / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D015470:Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D015458:Leukemia, T-Cell / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D054198:Precursor Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia-Lymphoma / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000473:pathology
chemical_list: D005819:Genetic Markers; D001124:Argininosuccinate Synthase