Search for neuroblastoma loci: characterization of tumor cell lines that could facilitate their positional cloning.

Specific chromosomal aberrations might indicate the position of genes responsible for a particular disease.Neuroblastoma is characterized by frequent deletions and/or rearrangements of the subtelomeric 1p regionwhich, accordingly, is believed to host one or more oncosuppressor gene(s) directly or indirectly involved inthe development of this and other tumors. Identification of these genes could be facilitated if cell lines withwell characterized interstitial deletions or reciprocal translocations could be available for application of 'positionalcloning' strategies.In the present report we present additional and novel molecular data on three well established neuroblastomacell lines (NLF, NMB and NGP). In one of these we have identified two sites that might be good candidatesfor hosting oncosuppressor genes; one of these is flanked by the D1S47 and ENO1 loci while the other is distalto the A12M2 locus.