title: [Molecular analysis of telomere length in follicular lymphomas. Its participation in tumor progression].
abstract: Telomeres are essential for maintaining chromosomal integrity and stability. We studied here telomere length (TL) in bone marrow and/or lymph node from 36 patients: 29 with follicular lymphoma (FL) at diagnosis and 7 with diffuse large B cell lymphoma secondary to FL (S-DLBCL). TL was evaluated using terminal restriction fragments (TRF) assay. BCL-2 gene rearrangement was analyzed by nested and long distance PCR. Mean TRF values showed significant telomere shortening in FL (4.18 +/- 0.18 Kb) and S-DLBCL (3.31 +/- 0.25 Kb) respect to controls (8.50 +/- 0.50 Kb) (p<0.001). Differences between both histological subtypes (p=0.036) were also detected. Moreover, the samples positive for BCL-2 rearrangements showed longer TL (4.25 +/- 0.19 Kb) than the negative ones (3.39 +/- 0.30 Kb) (p=0.023). A trend to telomere shortening was observed when Major Breakpoint Region (MBR-JH), minor cluster region (mcr-JH) and BCL-2 negative patients were compared (4.35 +/- 0.21 Kb; 3.84 +/- 0.45 Kb and 3.39 +/- 0.30 Kb, respectively). Our results show a TL reduction in FL and S-DLBCL, with significant short TRFs in the last group, suggesting the participation of telomere shortening in tumor progression. Furthermore, the differences detected between BCL-2 positive and negative FL support the involvement of diverse pathogenic mechanisms.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Genética, Instituto de Investigaciones Hematológicas Mariano R. Castex, Academia Nacional de Medicina, Buenos Aires. acottliar@yahoo.com.ar
authors.forename: Alejandra S H
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Cottliar
authors.forename: María F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Noriega
authors.forename: Marina
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Narbaitz
authors.forename: Irma R
authors.initials: IR
authors.lastname: Slavutsky
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001853:Bone Marrow / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D005724:Ganglia / Q000473:pathology; D019254:Genes, bcl-2 / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D016393:Lymphoma, B-Cell / Q000235:genetics*; D008224:Lymphoma, Follicular / Q000235:genetics*; D016403:Lymphoma, Large B-Cell, Diffuse / Q000235:genetics*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016615:Telomere / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*