Estimation of cell proliferation in gliomas

Introduction. The homeostasis of tissues depends on a strict control of cell growth, differentiation and death. Several proteins, which are involved on the regulation of the cell cycle, can suffer diverse alterations and produce an uncontrolled cell proliferation and the genesis of a neoplastic process. The assessment of cell proliferation is an useful method applied to Neurooncology in order to know the behavior of gliomas. Development. This work is focussed on the analysis of different methods, all of them employed to study the cell proliferation: immunostaining of proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) and Ki-67, DNA content and ploidy by flow cytometry, in vitro incorporation of bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) and the identification of apoptotic cells. The study of the DNA by flow cytometry establishes a relationship between ploidy and the prognostic of gliomas. The assessment of PCNA provides us with objective data about the proliferative activity of gliomas. Both Ki-67 expression and BrdU incorporation are also useful methods in the study of gliomas. Conclusions. In short, the most malignant gliomas are characterized by a high frequency of aneuploidies and high PCNA, Ki-67 and BrdU labelling indexes. AN of these described methods can be used as prognostic markers complementary to the classic criteria employed nowadays.