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. 2012;7(4):e35596.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0035596. Epub 2012 Apr 18.

miRNAs expression analysis in paired fresh/frozen and dissected formalin fixed and paraffin embedded glioblastoma using real-time pCR

Dario de Biase  1 , Michela Visani, Luca Morandi, Gianluca Marucci, Cristian Taccioli, Serenella Cerasoli, Agostino Baruzzi, Annalisa Pession; PERNO Study Group
Collaborators, Affiliations

miRNAs expression analysis in paired fresh/frozen and dissected formalin fixed and paraffin embedded glioblastoma using real-time pCR

Dario de Biase et al. PLoS One. 2012.

Abstract

miRNAs are small molecules involved in gene regulation. Each tissue shows a characteristic miRNAs epression profile that could be altered during neoplastic transformation. Glioblastoma is the most aggressive brain tumour of the adult with a high rate of mortality. Recognizing a specific pattern of miRNAs for GBM could provide further boost for target therapy. The availability of fresh tissue for brain specimens is often limited and for this reason the possibility of starting from formalin fixed and paraffin embedded tissue (FFPE) could very helpful even in miRNAs expression analysis. We analysed a panel of 19 miRNAs in 30 paired samples starting both from FFPE and Fresh/Frozen material. Our data revealed that there is a good correlation in results obtained from FFPE in comparison with those obtained analysing miRNAs extracted from Fresh/Frozen specimen. In the few cases with a not good correlation value we noticed that the discrepancy could be due to dissection performed in FFPE samples. To the best of our knowledge this is the first paper demonstrating that the results obtained in miRNAs analysis using Real-Time PCR starting from FFPE specimens of glioblastoma are comparable with those obtained in Fresh/Frozen samples.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Scatter plot showing Spearman correlation between Fresh/Frozen and FFPE-dissected groups.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Median fold-change calculated per each miRNA between 30 paired Fresh/Frozen and FFPE samples.
The y-axis represents the fold-change value.
Figure 3
Figure 3. Comparison between miRNAs expression profile in Fresh/Frozen and in FFPE specimens.
a) Example of one specimen with a good correlation of miRNAs expression profile obtained in Fresh/Frozen (pointed line) and in FFPE specimen (squared line); b) Example of one specimen with a correlation less than r<0.65 of miRNAs expression profile obtained in Fresh/Frozen (pointed line) and in FFPE specimen (squared line).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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