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化（PBC）是一种器官特异性自身免疫性疾病，但靶分子仍不清楚。本研究采用激光捕获显微切割（LCM）技术和微阵列技术，成功采集了PBC患者胆管上皮细胞，并利用T7 RNA聚合酶扩增了胆管上皮细胞中的靶分子，比较了正常人、慢性丙型肝炎患者和PBC患者胆管上皮细胞的基因表达谱。PBC患者的胆管上皮细胞中某些基因的表达较正常胆管上皮细胞高，而慢性丙型肝炎患者的胆管上皮细胞中某些基因的表达也较正常胆管上皮细胞高，这可能是门静脉炎症所致。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.