[Molecular markers for colorectal cancer liver metastases: initial results and perspectives]

Systematic allelotyping of colorectal cancers and liver metastases is realized since 1996 in a close collaboration between the surgery, pathology departments and the molecular biology laboratory. Using amplification of 35 different microsatellites allelic imbalances and microsatellites instabilities were recorded. Beside the well documented increasing amount of genomic rearrangements we identified a subset of early stages tumors presenting a profile of rearrangement corresponding to high grades, and high grades cancers with a molecular profile corresponding to low grade. The comparison of synchrones liver metastases and colorectal tumors allowed us to propose for a more extensive studies the existence of sensitive structural chromosomic regions affecting separately both chromosomes and that it should be possible to identify a limited number of specific genes concerned by most of the advanced stages.