6Q DELETIONS IN ACUTE LYMPHOBLASTIC-LEUKEMIA AND NON-HODGKINS-LYMPHOMAS

Deletions on the long arm of chromosome 6 are frequently found in acut e lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and non-Hodgkin's lymphomas (NHL), We h ave used polymerase chain reaction analysis to study loss of heterozyg osity of 16 microsatellite markers on chromosome 6 in 74 ALL and 54 NH L patients. Our results show that deletions of 6q in ALL are more freq uent than what has been reported in previous studies, occurring in at least 32% of the patients. The corresponding figure for NHL patients i s 7%. Our results define a region of minimal deletion in ALL of less t han 500 kb between markers D6S1709 and D6S434. The common region of de letion in NHL is located telomeric of this region. Thus, two different tumor suppressor genes on chromosome 6q seem to be relevant for the d evelopment of lymphoid malignancies. (C) 1998 by The American Society of Hematology.