改良TRAP法によるテロメラーゼ活性の検出

概要

論文の詳細を見る
The ends of mammalian chromosomes have specialized structure called telomeres, which are composed of the TTAGGG repeats. Maintenance of the telomere length is crucial for survival of mammalian cells. Telomerase, an RNA-containing reverse transcriptase is responsible for elongation of shortened telomeres. To detect telomerase activity, the TRAP assay was developed by Kim et al. in 1994, and until recently, it has been commonly used. Although the TRAP assay is an excellent system, we found some shortcomings in the original design. We modified the original TRAP assay at several points including the design of the primers, PCR cycling conditions and the labeling method of the PCR products. Our modification made the TRAP assay more sensitive, more quantitative and more reliable. We report here our modified TRAP assay.
2004-03-23