Transcription profiling of human breast stroma and epithelium after curative radiotherapy to investigate the pathogenesis of late radiation injury in humans

Gene expression profiling of normal tissues after curative radiotherapy was carried out to investigate the pathogenesis of late radiation injury in humans. Irradiated and control normal breast tissue was collected from patients undergoing bilateral mastectomy for ipsilateral tumour relapse or prophylaxis following radiotherapy for breast cancer. Using P.A.L.M. laser capture microdissection (LCM) of frozen sections, breast tissue was separated into an epithelial compartment (terminal duct lobular units and ducts) and a stromal compartment (remaining tissue). RNA was extracted, amplified and hybridised to a 20k cDNA array against a breast tissue reference RNA. Expression profiles of irradiated vs control breast were compared for each tissue compartment