Detection of translocations of 10p by non-radioactive in situ hybridization of VIM gene in SV40-transformed human cell lines.

SV40-transformed human fibroblasts exhibit characteristic chromosome imbalances, fairly well correlated with the activity of enzymes encoded by genes located on chromosome segments either in deficiency or in excess. However, a major discrepancy existed for the expression of vimentin gene (VIM), which was high, even though the map location of the gene (10p) was missing in many cell lines. An in situ hybridization technique using a biotinylated probe for the human VIM was applied to detect eventual cryptic translocations, as chromosome 10p is difficult to identify. In two cell lines (WI 98 and HEL1 HBLT) in which a loss of copy number of 10p was assumed after karyotyping, a signal for VIM was detected in unidentified short arms of derivative chromosomes. This exemplifies that in situ hybridization is a powerful complement to classical cytogenetics to detect rearrangements in highly rearranged karyotypes from transformed or cancerous cells. These results also strengthen the interpretation of the correlation between karyotypic and metabolic imbalances in transformed cells.