El fenotipo de inestabilidad de microsatélites (MIN) revela un patrón específico de mutaciones durante la carcinogénesis del colon

it has been investigated the presence of mutations in apoptosis, growth and cellular diferentiation and immunologic related genes in a total of 132 colon cancers chosen at random. the tumors that presented alterations at bax, tgfb-rii and b2m genes appear to constitute a homogeneous group that shares the characteristic of microsatellite instability at bat 26 and bat40 loci. on the contrary, none of the tumors min negatives presented alterations in the repetition elements of these genes, although some of them also had alterations in the expression of antigens of hla, but never associated to mutations in the gene of b2m gene. the fact that in most of the cases, the detected mutations represent biallelic inactivations, it supposes that these genes are involved in the tumorigenesis of these tumors, by a selection clonal process, and probably through a mutagenic pathway different of the observed in most of the sporadic colon cancers.