Gene expression profiling in paired normal, apparently normal and breast tumour tissues

The main objective of the study was to identify potential diagnostic and follow up markers along with therapeutic targets for breast cancer. We performed gene expression studies using the microarray technology on 65 samples including 41 breast tumours [24 early stage, 17 locally advanced, 18 adjacent normal tissue [paired normal] and 6 apparently normal from breasts which had been operated for non-malignant conditions. All the samples had frozen section done – tumours needed to have 70% or more tumour cells; paired normal and apparently normal had to be morphologically normal with no tumour cells. Two-dye experiments using Universal Control RNA (Stratagene) and RNA from tissues. Biological replicates - Apparently normal = 6, Paired normal = 18, Breast tumor tissues = 41