Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UMLS:C0017636 (glioblastoma)
 18,345 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

To unearth glioma-specific genes in human glioblastoma, the serial analysis of gene expression technique was applied to a primary glioblastoma, using cultured human astrocytes as a normal control. Among the top 147 most-expressed tags in glioblastoma, we found a tag, TTTTGGGTAT, that originated from an unidentified gene and which was not detected in human astrocyte cultures. Real-time quantitative reverse transcription-PCR showed that MAGE-E1 expression was 2.6-15-fold enriched in glioblastoma relative to human astrocytes. Expressed sequence tags containing this tag were homologous to the melanoma-associated antigen gene (MAGE) family, and this new cDNA, named MAGE-E1, was cloned by the 5'-rapid amplification of cDNA ends technique. Three alternatively spliced variants (MAGE-E1a-c) were found, and deduced amino acid sequence showed that MAGE-E1a and -E1b shared the MAGE-conserved region, whereas -E1c did not. This suggests that although MAGE-E1c is expressed from one of the MAGE family, it has distinct functions from other members. Tissue distribution analysis showed that MAGE-E1 was distinct from other MAGEs. MAGE-E1 expression was detected only in brain and ovary among normal tissues. Interestingly, MAGE-E1a and/or -E1b were specifically expressed in glioma cells among cancer cells. These results indicate that MAGE-E1 is a novel and glioma-specific member of MAGE family.
 ...
PMID:MAGE-E1, a new member of the melanoma-associated antigen gene family and its expression in human glioma. 1140 56

We prepared retroviruses carrying the lacZ gene or herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HTK) gene with titers of 1.4-2.5 x 10(11) colony-forming units (cfu)/ml, and stereotaxically inoculated only 3 microliters of the retroviruses into a mouse glioma model. This resulted in highly efficient transduction in vivo. The transduced glioma cells migrated far from the implantation site, potentiating the induction of the remarkable bystander effect. Following repetitive ganciclovir (GCV) intraperitoneal injection, effective killing of glioma cells in the mouse brain was observed. The transduction efficiency was nearly as high as that observed for the implantation of high-titer retrovirus-producing fibroblasts. Eighty per cent of brain tumor-bearing mice were completely cured by our treatment protocol using concentrated HTK-harboring retroviruses. Our results suggest that repeated inoculations of high-titer retroviruses carrying the HTK gene followed by GCV treatment may be a promising strategy for the clinical treatment of malignant gliomas. To achieve further safety in the gene therapy of glioma, genes abundantly expressed in human glioblastoma were searched by the Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE) technique. Among the top-147 most expressed tags in glioblastoma, we found a tag, TTTTGGGTAT, originated from an unidentified gene, which was not detected in human astrocyte cultures. Real-time quantitative RT-PCR showed that MAGE-E1 expression was 2.6-15 fold enriched in glioblastoma relative to human astrocytes. Expressed Sequence Tags (ESTs) containing this tag were homologous to melanoma-associated antigen gene (MAGE) family, and this new cDNA, named MAGE-E1, was cloned by 5'-rapid amplification of cDNA ends (RACE) technique. MAGE-E1 expression was enriched in glioblastoma and low in other cancers, and MAGE-E1 expression was detected only in brain and ovary among normal tissues. These results indicate that MAGE-E1 is a novel and glioma-specific member of MAGE family, which can be applied to glioma-specific gene transduction.
 ...
PMID:Treatment of glioblastoma by direct inoculation of concentrated high titer-recombinant retrovirus carrying the herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase gene. 1143 53