A member of the melanoma antigen-encoding gene (MAGE) family is expressed in human skin during wound healing.

MAGE-1 has been identified as a human gene, which directs the expression of an antigen being recognized on melanoma cells by autologous cytolytic T cells. MAGE-1 is expressed in melanomas and some other tumors. It has been proposed that this gene may be linked to the transformation event and therefore might serve as an approach to precisely targeted immunotherapy. Prior to such an approach, extensive testing of normal human tissue is necessary to establish the tumor-specific nature of MAGE-1 expression. Similar to events that occur during neoplastic tumor growth and spreading, wound healing involves a complex interrelationship between various cell types which migrate, proliferate and differentiate. Therefore, we investigated the expression of MAGE-1 in skin during wound repair. We could detect MAGE-1 mRNA by RT-PCR followed by specific hybridization as well as by Northern blotting in human skin from the 1st to the 7th day after wounding. Comparison of the expression of MAGE mRNA with that of beta-actin mRNA showed that it is expressed in amounts equal to about and at least one-fifth that of beta-actin. Our data strongly suggest that MAGE mRNA expression is not necessarily linked to neoplastic transformation, but rather represents the function of a cellular gene which is activated during inflammation or early tissue repair.