Molecular characterization of translocation (6;9) in acute nonlymphocytic leukemia

Specific chromosomal translocations are one of the defects associated with leukemia. Isolation and characterization of genes affected by these translocations may give insight into the processes of both leukemogenesis and normal hematopoiesis. When the experiments described in this thesis were started, several genes involved in translocations in lymphoid leukemia were isolated. These genes were all translocated into T-cell receptor and Immunoglobulin loci, which deregulated their expression. In myeloid leukemia only translocation (9;22) was characterized molecularly and the resulting bcr-abl gene was the only fusion gene known. Chapter 1 gives an overview of what is known to date about genes involved in leukemogenesis. To extend the research on the molecular characterization of translocations in myeloid leukemia, we decided to clone and characterize the translocation breakpoints of t(6;9) that characterizes a subtype of acute myeloid leukemia. Chapter 2 gives an introduction to t(6;9) AML and reports the results of our investigations. Chapter 3 discusses these results in relation to our current understanding of leukemogenesis