A polymerase chain reaction-based method for the semiquantitative study of interleukin-8 mRNA in human basophil leukocytes.

We examined a potential method for quantitative analysis of cytokine expression patterns in purified human basophil leukocyte preparations. Basophil mRNA was reverse transcribed and cytokine cDNA levels determined by competitive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with internal standard cDNAs constructed by site-directed mutagenesis. Co-reverse transcribed glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate-dehydrogenase (GAPDH) cDNA levels were used as an internal control to correct for unequal efficiencies in RNA isolation and reverse transcription.