TY - JOUR
T1 - Multiarm high-throughput integration site detection
T2 - Limitations of LAM-PCR technology and optimization for clonal analysis
AU - Harkey, Michael A.
AU - Kaul, Rajinder
AU - Jacobs, Michael A.
AU - Kurre, Peter
AU - Bovee, Don
AU - Levy, Ruth
AU - Blau, C. Anthony
PY - 2007/6
Y1 - 2007/6
N2 - Retroviral integration provides a unique and heritable genomic tag for a target cell and its progeny, enabling studies of clonal composition and repopulation kinetics after gene transfer into hematopoietic stem cells. The clonal tracking method, linear amplification-mediated polymerase chain reaction (LAM-PCR) is widely employed to follow the hematopoietic output of retrovirally marked stem cells. Here we examine the capabilities and limitations of conventional LAM-PCR to track individual clones in a complex multiclonal mix. Using artificial mixtures of retrovirally marked, single-cell-derived clones, we demonstrate that LAM-PCR fails to detect 30-40% of the clones, even after exhaustive analysis. Furthermore, the relative abundance of specific clones within a mix is not accurately represented, deviating by as much as 60-fold from their true abundance. We describe an optimized, multiarm, high-throughput modification of LAM-PCR that improves the global detection capacity to greater than 90% with exhaustive sampling, facilitates accurate estimates of the total pool size from smaller samplings, and provides a rapid, cost-effective approach to the generation of large insertion-site data bases required for evaluation of vector integration preferences. The inability to estimate the abundance of individual clones within mixtures remains a serious limitation. Thus, although LAM-PCR is a powerful tool for identification of integration sites and for estimations of clonal complexity, it fails to provide the semiquantitative information necessary for direct, reliable tracking of individual clones in a chimeric background.
AB - Retroviral integration provides a unique and heritable genomic tag for a target cell and its progeny, enabling studies of clonal composition and repopulation kinetics after gene transfer into hematopoietic stem cells. The clonal tracking method, linear amplification-mediated polymerase chain reaction (LAM-PCR) is widely employed to follow the hematopoietic output of retrovirally marked stem cells. Here we examine the capabilities and limitations of conventional LAM-PCR to track individual clones in a complex multiclonal mix. Using artificial mixtures of retrovirally marked, single-cell-derived clones, we demonstrate that LAM-PCR fails to detect 30-40% of the clones, even after exhaustive analysis. Furthermore, the relative abundance of specific clones within a mix is not accurately represented, deviating by as much as 60-fold from their true abundance. We describe an optimized, multiarm, high-throughput modification of LAM-PCR that improves the global detection capacity to greater than 90% with exhaustive sampling, facilitates accurate estimates of the total pool size from smaller samplings, and provides a rapid, cost-effective approach to the generation of large insertion-site data bases required for evaluation of vector integration preferences. The inability to estimate the abundance of individual clones within mixtures remains a serious limitation. Thus, although LAM-PCR is a powerful tool for identification of integration sites and for estimations of clonal complexity, it fails to provide the semiquantitative information necessary for direct, reliable tracking of individual clones in a chimeric background.
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U2 - 10.1089/scd.2007.0015
DO - 10.1089/scd.2007.0015
M3 - Article
C2 - 17610368
AN - SCOPUS:34347337597
SN - 1547-3287
VL - 16
SP - 381
EP - 392
JO - Stem Cells and Development
JF - Stem Cells and Development
IS - 3
ER -