| 摘要 |
<p>The invention relates to methods for the detection of metastatic diseases such as metastatic prostate, breast and lung carcinoma, in fresh or fixed biological samples. Nucleic acids are purified from fixed samples of patient tissue or fluid suspected to contain metastatic tissue and reverse transcribed to cDNA. Metastatic-specific sequences within the cDNA are amplified by polymerase chain reaction. Primers for PCR amplification comprise sequences from the exonic regions of a metastatic-specific expression product that span regions of expressed RNA that are not degraded even after long-term storage in paraffin. Metastatic-specific expression products include, for example, nucleic acids that contain sequences of the prostate specific antigen gene for use in the detection of metastatic prostate carcinoma. The resulting amplified nucleic acid sequences will include metastatic-specific sequences which can be easily detected. The invention also relates to nucleic acid primers which can be used for PCR amplification of metastatic-specific sequences such as sequences which correspond to the exonic regions of the PSA gene, and to kits which comprise these primers and other reagents useful for the rapid detection of metastatic diseases.</p> |
