Detection of allelic loss within the beta 1-interferon gene in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia using differential PCR.
Deletion of the short arm of chromosome 9p involving the beta 1-interferon (IFN) gene has been implicated in the process of malignant transformation in lymphomas and acute lymphoblastic leukemias. Since cytogenetic analysis is frequently unsuccessful in clinical samples, we used a recently described differential PCR technique to detect losses within the beta 1-IFN gene in 86 acute leukemias. Using differential PCR, no beta 1-IFN deletion was detected in 44 acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and eight control samples. However, five of 42 acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) probes (12%) exhibited loss of the beta 1-IFN gene (three common ALL, two T-ALL). Cytogenetic analysis was performed independently in three of these five cases and revealed abnormalities of chromosome 9p in two samples. Two of five T-ALL cases exhibited a loss within the beta 1-IFN gene, compared with 3/29 c-ALLs, suggesting a predominance of IFN gene loss in T-ALLs. These data indicate that PCR can be used for rapid detection of gene dosage phenomena in clinical leukemia samples.
Schmidt
C A
CA
Abteilung für Innere Medizin und Poliklinik, Universitätsklinikum Rudolf Virchow, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany.
Neubauer
A
A
Seeger
K H
KH
Rochlitz
C F
CF
Binder
T
T
Oettle
H
H
Henze
G
G
Liu
E T
ET
Huhn
D
D
Siegert
W
W
D000208:Acute Disease; D000328:Adult; D000483:Alleles; D002648:Child; D002872:Chromosome Deletion; D006801:Humans; D016899:Interferon-beta / Q000235:genetics*; D007951:Leukemia, Myeloid / Q000235:genetics; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods*; D054198:Precursor Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia-Lymphoma / Q000235:genetics*
D016899:Interferon-beta