PROCESSES FOR DIAGNOSING AND ANALYSING TUMOURS

摘要

The invention relates to a process for diagnosing and analysing tumours which is based on detecting the expression of certain variant exons of the CD44-gene. Detection may be carried out at the protein or nucleic acid level. In a preferred embodiment the expression is detected in biopsy material using exon-specific antibodies. Thus, for example, v6-expression is a suitable prognostic parameter for breast cancer, the expression of a transitional epitope which is coded by exons v7 and v8 serves to diagnose cervical cancer.