Rapid diagnosis of drug-resistant genes by PCR assay

This report concerns the utility of the reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and quantitative PCR (QPCR) assay to detect the drug-resistance of related genes. The expression of some drug-resistance genes was compared with the sensitivity and resistance-acquired cancer cell lines to anti-cancer drugs by Northern blot analysis and PCR assay. The resistance cell lines exhibited an enhanced expression of multi-drug resistance (MDR-1), thymidylate synthase (TS), c-fos and DNA polymerase beta genes. Then these genes that expressed mRNA were quantitated using RT-PCR. The expression of the genes was dependent on their sensitivity (IC50) to anti-cancer drugs. Additionally, the QPCR assay has been developed as a rapid method for the expression of drug-resistance genes and applied to the PCR products amplified by the RT-PCR. Thus the QPCR assay for the expression of genes will allow rapid detection of the drug-resistance to chemotherapy in human cancers.