J.T. den Dunnen1, V.C. de Jager2, M. van den Berg1, R. Kerkhoven3, R.F. Florijn1, H.J. Tanke2, G.J.B. van Ommen1 and A.K. Raap2.
Genome Technology Center, Departments of 1Human and Clinical Genetics and 2Molecular Cell Biology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands; 3Nederlands Kanker Instituut, Amsterdam.
The DNA-chip and micro-array technology is one of the most exciting new technologies developed in the framework of the Human Genome Project, aimed at massive parallel functional analysis. The Genome Technology Center (GTC) in Leiden (http://www.dmd.nl/gtc.html) has recently acquired the basic instrumentation to apply this technology, including an arrayer, a scanner and a large cDNA collection (40,000 clones). The instrumentation has been installed and is currently operational, offered as a facilitairy service for researchers in Leiden and elsewhere. Production of arrays for general expression analysis (containing 5,000-10,000 cDNA's per glass slide) is in progress; due to the logistic problems related to working with this number of clones, realization will take some time.
The GTC has initiated several projects based on the application of the array technology. These projects include determination of the cellular expression pattern and disturbances therein related to genetic disease using cDNA-arrays (expression profiling), the detection of copy number changes in genomic DNA using arrays of genomic clones (array CGH) and point mutation detection using oligonucleotide-arrays. Furthermore, collaborations exist towards optimization of the technology, in particular regarding target labelling and signal generation. We will present an overview of the results obtained so far and discuss the problems encountered. To spread the technological experience acquired and to stimulate collaborations on a national level, we have initiated the ArrayNL-platform (http://www.dmd.nl/arrayNL.html).