title: Tumor spreading to the contralateral ovary in bilateral ovarian carcinoma is a late event in clonal evolution.
abstract: Cancer of the ovary is bilateral in 25%. Cytogenetic analysis could determine whether the disease in bilateral cases is metastatic or two separately occurring primary tumors, but karyotypic information comparing the two cancerous ovaries is limited to a single report with 11 informative cases. We present a series of 32 bilateral ovarian carcinoma cases, analyzed by karyotyping and high-resolution CGH. Our karyotypic findings showed that spreading to the contralateral ovary had occurred in bilateral ovarian cancer cases and that it was a late event in the clonal evolution of the tumors. This was confirmed by the large number of similar changes detected by HR-CGH in the different lesions from the same patient. The chromosomal bands most frequently involved in structural rearrangements were 19p13 (n = 12) and 19q13 (n = 11). The chromosomal bands most frequently gained by both tumorous ovaries were 5p14 (70%), 8q23-24 (65%), 1q23-24 (57%), and 12p12 (48%), whereas the most frequently lost bands were 17p11 (78%), 17p13 (74%), 17p12 (70%), 22q13 (61%), 8p21 and 19q13 (52%), and 8p22-23 (48%). This is the first time that 5p14 is seen gained at such a high frequency in cancer of the ovary; possibly oncogene(s) involved in bilateral ovarian carcinogenesis or tumor progression may reside in this band.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Genetics, The Norwegian Radium Hospital, Oslo University Hospital, 0310 Oslo, Norway.
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Micci
authors.forename: Lisbeth
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Haugom
authors.forename: Terje
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ahlquist
authors.forename: Vera M
authors.initials: VM
authors.lastname: Abeler
authors.forename: Claes G
authors.initials: CG
authors.lastname: Trope
authors.forename: Ragnhild A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Lothe
authors.forename: Sverre
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Heim