Prostate tissue from 43 patients with prostate cancers and ten with benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH) were studied for loss of heterozygosity of the RB1 gene.
Our MSP and direct DNA sequencing showed that ERalpha-A, ERalpha-B, and PR-A genes were unmethylated and ERalpha-C and PR-B were methylated in endometrial cancers although ERalpha-A and ERalpha-B were methylated and ERalpha-C, PRA and PRB were unmethylated in prostate cancers.
Aberrations of the long arm of chromosome 13 are common in prostate cancer and were initially attributed to alterations of the RB1 gene in band q14 of the chromosome.
These results suggest that inactivation of a putative tumor suppressor gene(s) including the RB1 gene on 13q14 plays an important role in human prostate cancer.