title: Reliable housekeeping gene combination for quantitative PCR of lymph nodes in patients with prostate cancer.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  To reliably compare the results of gene expression studies, the expression of the target gene should be normalized to the expression of a reference gene. For lymph node metastases of prostate cancer, no data on polymerase chain reaction (PCR) normalization have yet been reported. We aimed to determine the most reliable reference gene combination for this purpose in patients with prostate cancer.
  
  
  METHODS
  Ten histologically- positive and ten negative lymph nodes of patients with prostate cancer were analyzed respectively. Expression of six candidate reference genes was comparatively assessed with quantitative Real-time PCR. The most stably-expressed gene combination was determined with geNorm software version 3.4.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Hypoxanthine phosphoribosyltransferase-1 (HPRT1) and TATA box binding protein (TPB) were found to be the most stably expressed genes, with their combination having an expression stability value of M=0.17.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Gene combination HPRT1 and TPB has the potential to be utilized for normalization in gene profiling assessment of metastatic and non-metastatic pelvic lymph node tissue from patients with prostate cancer.
authors: Department of Urology, Theodor-Stern-Kai 7, 60590 Frankfurt am Main, Germany. david.schilling@kgu.de.
authors: Igor
authors: I
authors: Tsaur
authors: Markus
authors: M
authors: Renninger
authors: Joerg
authors: J
authors: Hennenlotter
authors: Elsie
authors: E
authors: Oppermann
authors: Marita
authors: M
authors: Munz
authors: Ursula
authors: U
authors: Kuehs
authors: Arnulf
authors: A
authors: Stenzl
authors: David
authors: D
authors: Schilling
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D020043:Genes, Essential; D006801:Humans; D008207:Lymphatic Metastasis / Q000235:genetics*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011471:Prostatic Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods*
keywords: Lymph node metastases; molecular staging; polymerase chain reaction; prostate cancer; reference gene