Mutational Analysis of PUMA Gene in Non-small Cell Lung Cancers

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: It has become clear that, together with proliferation, deregulation of apoptosis plays a pivotal role in tumorigenesis, and the somatic mutations of apoptosis-related genes have been reported in human cancers. PUMA, a pro- apoptotic member of Bcl-2 family, mediates p53-deependent and -independent apoptosis. The aim of this study was to explore whether alteration of PUMA protein expression is a characteristic of human lung cancers. MATERIALS AND METHODS: To explore the possibility that the genetic alterations of PUMA might be involved in the development of human cancers, we analyzed the entire coding region and all splice sites of human PUMA gene in 100 human non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLCs) by polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based single-strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP). RESULTS: The PCR-SSCP analysis detected no mutation in the entire coding regions and all splice sites of human PUMA gene in the 100 NSCLCs. CONCLUSION: The data presented here suggested that PUMA gene mutation may not contribute to the pathogenesis of human NSCLCs.