Summary
This communication describes a method and results for the immunohistochemical detection of a tumour-associated isoenzyme of aldehyde dehydrogenase (BALDH). The method is a substantial improvement over standard histochemical detection methods which require either frozen or mildly fixed tissues, since BALDH expression was detected in the cells of formalinfixed paraffin-embedded liver tissues of both mice and rats.
Using the immunohistochemical method, we detected BALDH expression diethylnitrosamine-induced hepatomas in the male Sprague-Dawley rat and in male B6C3F1 mouse hepatomas induced with either diethylnitrosamine, ethylnitrosourea or dichloroacetic acid. BALDH was also detected in three hepatoma cell culture lines which express different levels of BALDH. These results were compared to results with normal liver and hepatoma sections from the same animals and the three cell culture lines using a standard histochemical method to detect BALDH. In nearly all these tissue sections and cell cultures, expression of BALDH was detected in identical sites with either method.
The diethylnitrosamine and dichloracetic acid induction of the BALDH isozyme, as reported here, has not been reported previously and further substantiates the use of BALDH as a histochemical marker for mouse hepatocarcinogenesis. Given the few reliable histochemical markers for mouse hepatocarcinogenesis, the immunohistochemical method will be useful for further validation of BALDH as a histochemical marker for this species. Thus, BALDH expression could be detected in any number of carcinogen-induced lesions such as altered foci, nodule or hepatomas, from archived, formalin-fixed tissues of past mouse carcinogenesis studies which were based on a variety of mouse strains, carcinogens and induction protocols.
References
Anonymous (1983) Pathology of mouse liver neoplasm. InThe relevance of mouse liver hepatoma to human carcinogenic risk. A report of the international expert advisory committee to the nutrition foundation. pp. 1–34. The Nutrition Foundation, Washington, D.C.
Fischer, G., Lillienblum, W., Ullrich, D., &Bock, K. W. (1986) Immunohistochemical differentiation of gammaglutamyltranspeptidase in focal lesions and in zone I of rat liver after treatment with chemical carcinogens.Carcinogenesis 7, 1405.
Lin, K.-H., Winters, A. L. &Lindahl, R. (1984) Regulation of aldehyde dehydrogenase activity in five rat hepatoma cell lines.Cancer Res. 44, 5219–26.
Lin, K.-H. Leach, M. F., Winters, A. L. &Lindahl, R. (1986) Characterization and aldehyde dehydrogenase activity of 4 rat hepatoma cell lines produced by diethylnitrosamine-phenobarbital treatment.In Vitro 22, 263–72.
Lindahl, R. (1985) Recent studies on the regulation of aldehyde dehydrogenase activity during rat hepatocarcinogenesis. InEnzymology of Carbonyl Metabolism 2; Aldehyde Dehydrogenase, Aldo-Keto Reductase, and Alcohol Dehydrogenase pp. 91–9. New York A. R. Liss.
Lindahl, R., Clark R. &Evces, S. (1983) Histochemical localization of aldehyde dehydrogenase during rat hepatocarcinogenesis.Cancer Res. 43, 5972–7.
Lindahl, R. &Feinstein, R. N. (1976) Purification and immunochemical characterization of aldehyde dehydrogenase from 2-acetylaminofluorene-induced rat hepatomas.Biochem. Biophys. Acta 452, 345–55.
Pretlow, T. P., Goehring, P. L., Lapinsky, A. S. &Pretlow, T. G. (1987) Examination of enzyme altered foci with gammaglutamyltranspeptidase, aldehyde dehydrogenase, and other markers in methacrylate-embedded liver.Lab. Invest. 56, 96–100.
Richmond, R. E. &Pereira, M. A. (1986) Aldehyde dehydrogenase as a marker for chemically initiated mouse liver tumours.Cancer Letters 31, 205–11.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Richmond, R.E., De Angelo, A.B., Daniel, F.B. et al. Immunohistochemical detection of tumour-associated aldehyde dehydrogenase in formalin-fixed rat and mouse normal liver and hepatomas. Histochem J 22, 526–529 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01005974
Received:
Revised:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01005974