Technology insight: Application of molecular techniques to formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues from breast cancer.
Breast cancer is a heterogenous disease in terms of both clinical behavior and molecular characteristics. To develop prognostic and predictive markers for breast cancer, it would be useful to be able to analyze formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue (FPET) collected and banked from completed clinical trials. RNAs extracted from FPETs are chemically modified and fragmented, and are therefore not ideal substrates for gene-expression profiling assays. However, methods are being developed to optimize the use of such RNAs for high-throughput gene expression profiling assays. For microarray analysis, existing methods may be adequate for fresh FPET, but they do not work well with older FPET. For older samples, real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction is the method of choice for gene-expression profiling.
Paik
Soonmyung
S
Division of Pathology, National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project, Pittsburgh, PA 15212, USA. soon.paik@nsabp.org
Kim
Chung-yeul
CY
Song
Yong-kuk
YK
Kim
Wan-seop
WS
D001706:Biopsy / Q000379:methods; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology*; D004273:DNA, Neoplasm / Q000032:analysis; D005260:Female; D005404:Fixatives; D005557:Formaldehyde; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D006801:Humans; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D010232:Paraffin; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D013048:Specimen Handling; D014021:Tissue Preservation / Q000379:methods*
D004273:DNA, Neoplasm; D005404:Fixatives; D005557:Formaldehyde; D010232:Paraffin