QUANTITATIVE-ANALYSIS OF DNA ABERRATIONS AMPLIFIED BY COMPETITIVE POLYMERASE CHAIN-REACTION USING CAPILLARY ELECTROPHORESIS

We compared the use of capillary electrophoresis (CE) in a polymer net work with the use of slab gel electrophoresis for the quantitative ana lysis of polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-amplified DNA samples. We qua ntified residual lymphoma cells carrying a translocation between chrom osomes 14 and 18, in consecutive patient peripheral blood samples that were amplified by competitive PCR. For CE analysis we used a 4% linea r polyacrylamide network. Results show that the calculated number of t ranslocations in patient samples using both analyses were comparable. We conclude that CE is a sensitive, non-radioactive, fast and accurate method for quantitation of competitive PCR products.