Transcriptome sequencing of human breast cancer reveals aberrant intronic transcription in amplicons and dysregulation of alternative splicing with major therapeutic implications.

Advances in genomic and transcriptome sequencing are revealing the massive scale of previously unrecognised alterations occurring during neoplastic transformation. Breast cancers are genetically and phenotypically heterogeneous. Each of the three major subtypes [ERBB2 amplified, estrogen receptor (ESR)-positive and triple-negative] poses diagnostic and therapeutic challenges.

siRNA knockdown of ribosomal protein gene RPL19 abrogates the aggressive phenotype of human prostate cancer.

We provide novel functional data that posttranscriptional silencing of gene RPL19 using RNAi not only abrogates the malignant phenotype of PC-3M prostate cancer cells but is selective with respect to transcription and translation of other genes. Reducing RPL19 transcription modulates a subset of genes, evidenced by gene expression array analysis and Western blotting, but does not compromise cell proliferation or apoptosis in-vitro. However, growth of xenografted tumors containing the knocked-down RPL19 in-vivo is significantly reduced.

Primer: tissue fixation and preservation for optimal molecular analysis of urologic tissues.

Appreciation of the different methods of tissue handling is a prerequisite to obtaining accurate and biologically relevant tissue-based information. When a tissue sample is removed from its environment, biological changes are induced within its constituent cell population. It is inevitable that artefacts will be induced through obtaining and processing tissues, irrespective of whether the samples comprise a few cells derived by fine-needle aspiration or larger specimens obtained surgically.