ESR1 amplification in breast cancer by optimized RNase FISH: frequent but low-level and heterogeneous

Cathy B Moelans; Frederik Holst; Olaf Hellwinkel; Ronald Simon; Paul J van Diest

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0084189

ESR1 amplification in breast cancer by optimized RNase FISH: frequent but low-level and heterogeneous

PLoS One. 2013 Dec 18;8(12):e84189. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0084189. eCollection 2013.

Authors

Cathy B Moelans¹, Frederik Holst², Olaf Hellwinkel³, Ronald Simon⁴, Paul J van Diest¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Pathology, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
² Section of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Department of Clinical Science, Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen, Norway ; Department of Pathology, University Medical Center Hamburg Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.
³ Department of Legal Medicine, University Medical Center Hamburg Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.
⁴ Department of Pathology, University Medical Center Hamburg Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.

Abstract

Prevalence of ESR1 amplification in breast cancer is highly disputed and discrepancies have been related to different technical protocols and different scoring approaches. In addition, pre-mRNA artifacts have been proposed to influence outcome of ESR1 FISH analysis. We analyzed ESR1 gene copy number status combining an improved RNase FISH protocol with multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (MLPA) after laser microdissection. FISH showed a high prevalence of ESR1 gains and amplifications despite RNase treatment but MLPA did not confirm ESR1 copy number increases detected by FISH in more than half of cases. We suggest that the combination of the ESR1-specific intra-tumor heterogeneity and low-level copy number increase accounts for these discrepancies.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Artifacts
Breast Neoplasms / genetics*
Breast Neoplasms / pathology*
DNA Copy Number Variations
Estrogen Receptor alpha / genetics*
Gene Amplification*
Humans
In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence / methods*
Laser Capture Microdissection
Ribonucleases / metabolism*
Tissue Array Analysis

Substances

ESR1 protein, human
Estrogen Receptor alpha
Ribonucleases

Grants and funding

This study was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DGF SI 1347/3-1). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.