Mutations causing severe combined immunodeficiency: detection with a custom resequencing microarray.

Purpose: Mutation diagnosis of severe combined immunodeficiency is challenging because of the multiplicity of disease genes and large number of disease-causing mutations, including unique ones that continue to be found. A resequencing microarray could facilitate mutation detection, increasing the chance of diagnosing infants early for optimal rescue by hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.

Methods: After analyzing cumulative mutations, we developed a custom Affymetrix GeneChip microarray including probes representing exons and flanking regions of severe combined immunodeficiency disease genes.

Transcriptional analysis of the molecular basis of human kidney aging using cDNA microarray profiling.

Background: The molecular basis of renal aging is not completely understood.

Methods: We used global gene expression monitoring by cDNA microarrays to identify age associated genes in human kidney samples. Our samples included young (8 weeks-8 years, N= 4), adult (31-46 years, N= 7), and old kidneys (71-88 years, N= 9).

Arraying the orchestration of allograft pathology.

Microarrays, or gene chips, are exciting investigative tools for analyzing expression changes across thousands of genes in concert in tissues and cells of interest. Despite the relatively recent application of microarrays to transplant research, they hold great promise for unraveling the staging of rejection, stratifying patients towards more individualized treatment regimes, and discovering noninvasive biomarkers for monitoring of intragraft events. Bioinformatics tools are being developed to sift through the large data sets generated as "genomic fingerprints" of the underlying biologic pathways.