Gene expression profiling of biliary epithelial cells in primary biliary cirrhosis : laser microdissection and microarray analysis

虽然原发性胆汁性肝硬变(PBC)是一种器官特异性自身免疫性疾病，但靶分子仍未确定。我们尝试用激光捕获显微切割(LCM)和微阵列技术来鉴定PBC胆管上皮细胞中的靶分子。初步实验表明，成功地收集了纯胆管上皮细胞，并利用基于T7 RNA聚合酶的方法扩增了信息。比较了正常、慢性丙型肝炎和PBC患者胆管上皮细胞的基因表达谱。与正常胆管细胞相比，PBC患者胆管上皮细胞中部分基因表达增强，而慢性丙型肝炎患者的胆管上皮细胞中也有部分基因表达上调，提示其表达上调可能与门脉炎症有关。对PBC特异性基因表达的分析目前正在研究中。

Although primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is an organ-specific autoimmune disease, target molecules remains unidentified. We attempted to identify target molecules in biliary epithelial cells of PBC by laser capture microdissection (LCM) and micro-array technology.Preliminary experiments showed successful collection of pure biliary epithelial cells and amplification of messages by a T7 RNA polymerase based method.Gene expression profiles of biliary epithelial cells were compared among normal, chronic hepatitis C and PBC patients. Biliary epithelial cells from PBC patients demonstrated increased expression of some genes compared with normal biliary cells.However, some of the genes showing increased expression were also increased in biliary epithelial cells from chronic hepatitis C patients, suggesting that the increased expression might be induced by portal inflammation. Analysis of PBC specific gene expressions is now under study.