Expression data from chordoma and notochord (microarray)

Chordoma is a rare malignant tumor thought to originate from embryonic notochord. However, no molecular comparison of chordoma and notochord has been performed to date, leaving the identities of dysregulated pathways unclear. Absence of a molecular description of a control tissue clouds our understanding of chordoma. Thus, we conducted an unbiased comparison of chordoma and notochord using gene expression profiling to clarify chordoma’s tissue of origin and identify novel drug targets RNA was extracted from fresh chordoma tumors after surgical resection using Trizol. RNA from notochord was obtained via laser capture microdissection.