Interphase cytogenetics in paraffin-embedded sections from renal cortical neoplasms. Correlation with cytogenetic and...

Nonisotopic in situ hybridization (ISH) was performed on archival tissue sections from six renal cortical neoplasms and corresponding normal kidney tissue using pericentrometric (alpha-satellite) probes to chromosomes 1, 3, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 16, and 17. The results were correlated with classic cytogenetic analyses and flow cytometric DNA ploidy findings of these neoplasms. Our study shows that intratissue and intertissue ISH spot counts were generally homogeneous in normal kidney tissue and markedly heterogenous in tumor specimens. In all cases the correlation between the DNA Index and the ISH spot numbers was statistically significant. A correlation between modal and numerical chromosomal findings by cytogenetic analysis and ISH spot counts was found in three cases and was discordant in three cases. Our results also show that chromosomes 1, 3, 7, and 17 appear to manifest more propensity for aneuploidy than chromosomes 8, 10, 11, 12, and 16. We conclude that 1) numerical chromosomal aberrations by interphase in-situ hybridization correlate with DNA ploidy analysis in these tumors; 2) certain chromosomes may be more prone to aneuploidy than others; 3) determination of monosomy by ISH is less reliable on paraffin-embedded sections; and 4) the ISH technique complements conventional cytogenetic analysis in providing more information for the determination of cytogenetic aberrations and clonal heterogeneity in solid neoplasms.