Volume 51 (12): 1681-1688, 2003 Copyright ©The Histochemical Society, Inc. Evaluation of Cell Proliferation in Rat Tissues with BrdU, PCNA, Ki-67(MIB-5) Immunohistochemistry and In Situ Hybridization for Histone mRNA
Charles River Laboratories (LM,JRL,EBH) and Division of Biometry and Risk Assessment of National Center for Toxicological Research (RLK), Jefferson, Arkansas Correspondence to: Levan Muskhelishvili, PhD, Charles River Laboratories at National Center for Toxicological Research, 3900 NCTR Rd., MC 923, Jefferson, AR 72079. E-mail: lmuskhelishvili{at}nctr.fda.gov
The standard method for assessment of cell proliferation in paraffin-embedded tissue sections is 5-bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) immunohistochemistry (IHC). BrdU can be administered to laboratory animals via IP injections, is readily incorporated into nuclei during the DNA synthetic phase of the cell cycle, and is detected with an anti-BrdU antibody. This method has several disadvantages, and an accurate method for evaluation of proliferative activity that can substitute for BrdU IHC, when necessary, is of great interest to investigators. Alternative methods for detection of proliferating cells in tissue sections are proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) IHC, Ki-67 IHC, and in situ hybridization (ISH) for histone mRNA. To determine the optimal choice, we analyzed the correlation of anti-PCNA, anti-Ki-67(MIB-5), and histone mRNA labeling indices (LIs) with anti-BrdU LI in rat highly replicative (renewing) tissues. The correlation between anti-BrdU and histone mRNA LIs, as well as the correlation between anti-BrdU and anti-Ki-67 LIs, was statistically significant. There was no significant correlation between anti-BrdU and anti-PCNA LIs. These results suggest that both ISH for histone mRNA and IHC with MIB-5 are preferable techniques for assessment of cell proliferation in rat paraffin-embedded renewing tissues compared to PCNA IHC. They can substitute for BrdU IHC when necessary. (J Histochem Cytochem 51:16811688, 2003)
Key Words: proliferation immunohistochemistry in situ hybridization labeling indices
EVALUATION of cell proliferation in tissues of experimental animals is essential for toxicology and carcinogenesis studies and also to assess the efficiency of cytotoxic and chemopreventive drugs in cancer research (Lucas et al. 1998
For many years, the most common method to identify proliferating cells in tissue sections without the use of BrdU has been IHC detection of PCNA. PCNA, initially described by Miyachi et al. (1978)
Another IHC technique that has found application in the assessment of cell proliferation is the detection of Ki-67. The antigen Ki-67 is a ubiquitous human nuclear protein expressed in G1-, S-, and G2-phases of the cell cycle but not in the G0-phase (Gerdes et al. 1984
An alternative to the IHC approach to evaluate cell proliferation in tissue sections is to detect expression of histone mRNA. The synthesis of histone proteins is restricted to the S-phase of the cell cycle. During the S-phase the level of histone mRNA increases over 50-fold. When DNA synthesis is completed or inhibited, histone mRNAs are selectively and rapidly degraded with a half-life of 10 min (Heintz et al. 1983 An accurate method for evaluation of proliferative activity in tissues that can substitute for BrdU IHC when necessary is of great interest to investigators. Each of the candidate assays mentioned abovePCNA IHC, Ki-67(MIB-5) IHC, and ISH for histone mRNAhas its advantages and disadvantages. To determine the optimal choice, we analyzed the correlation of anti-PCNA, MIB-5, and histone mRNA LIs with anti-BrdU LI in rat renewing tissues.
Animals Male 12-week-old SpragueDawley rats were sacrificed by CO2 asphyxiation. At 2 hr before sacrifice, all rats (n=6) were given a single IP injection of BrdU (Sigma; St Louis, MO) at a dosage of 100 mg/kg body weight. The esophagus, duodenum, spleen, and a piece of dorsal skin were removed and separate samples of each tissue were fixed in 10% neutral buffered formalin for 24, 48, and 72 hr. After fixation the tissues were embedded in paraffin and serially sectioned. For histological evaluation the sections were stained with hematoxylin and eosin (H&E). The care of the animals and the experimental procedures were carried out according to the institutional guidelines.
Immunohistochemistry For IHC demonstration of Ki-67 or PCNA, tissue sections were quenched for endogenous peroxidase as described above and placed in an antigen retrieval solution (0.01 M citrate buffer, pH 6.0) for 15 min in a microwave oven at 100C at 600 W. After incubation in the casein block, mouse MAb anti-rat Ki-67 (clone MIB-5; DAKO) or mouse MAb anti-PCNA (clone PC10; DAKO) was applied to the sections at dilutions of 1:50 and 1:5000, respectively. Incubations with primary antibodies lasted for 1 hr at RT. The same secondary detection system described above was used to visualize antibody binding. Staining was developed with DAB, slides were counterstained with hematoxylin, dehydrated, and mounted. For negative control in the IHC procedures performed, mouse 10% normal serum or PBS replaced the primary antibodies.
ISH for Histone mRNA Paraffin sections were deparaffinized in xylene, hydrated in 100%, 95%, and 70% ethanol, and treated with 10 µg/ml proteinase K for 30 min at 37C. The sections then were washed in distilled water, dehydrated, and air-dried. The sections were incubated with probe solution for 2 hr at 37C. After washes in 0.1% Triton X-100 in Tris-buffered saline (TBS, pH 7.6), the sections were blocked in 10% normal rabbit serum for 10 min and then incubated with alkaline phosphatase-conjugated rabbit anti-FITC F(ab') (Novocastra) at a dilution of 1:100 for 30 min at RT. For demonstration of alkaline phosphatase activity, the sections were incubated overnight in the dark with 5-bromo-4-chloro-3-indolylphosphate (BCIP) and nitroblue tetrazolium (NBT) (Novocastra). The sections then were washed in distilled water and counterstained in hematoxylin for 10 sec. The sections were mounted with Crystal/Mount (Biomeda; Foster City, CA) and dried at 70C for 4060 min. For negative control, corresponding serial sections were hybridized with a fluoroscein-labeled random oligonucleotide cocktail (Novocastra).
Measurement of LIs and Statistical Analysis In epidermis of the skin and stratified squamous epithelium of esophagus of each animal, LI was expressed as the percentage of labeled cells per 1000 basal cells. In the duodenum, epithelial cells were counted from the lowest point of the crypt to the tip of the villus and the percentage of positive cells was calculated. The mean value of the percentages of labeled cells in three randomly chosen villi per animal was used for further calculations. In the spleen, the numbers of labeled cells were calculated per 3 mm2. In anti-PCNA-immunostained sections, LIs for growth fraction (anti-PCNA LI) and S-phase (anti-PCNAS LI) were calculated separately by respectively counting either all labeled cells or only cells with dark brown nuclei. All cell counts were performed using the x40 magnification objective lens.
The correlation between anti-BrdU, MIB-5, anti-PCNA, anti-PCNAS, and histone mRNA LIs was analyzed using Pearson's coefficient of correlation (Snedecor and Cochran 1967
Anti-BrdU LI was paired with each of the other four LIs and Pearson's correlation coefficient was calculated for each pair. Each correlation coefficient was tested for statistical significance using an approximate t-test with 22 degrees of freedom. To assure that distribution assumptions for Pearson's correlation coefficient were adequately met, Spearman's rank correlation coefficient (Snedecor and Cochran 1967
BrdU, MIB-5, PCNA IHC, and ISH for histone mRNA were performed on serial sections of rat paraffin-embedded tissues. In these sections, cells that incorporated BrdU displayed brown nuclei, with some variation in the strength of staining. Nuclear immunoreactivity revealed by MIB-5 usually had a dark brown granular appearance. In contrast, PCNA positivity was homogeneously dense, with nuclei showing variability in staining intensity and some proportion of cells displaying the immunoreactivity in cytoplasm as well. Histone mRNA-positive cells exhibited purple cytoplasm (Figure 1) . None of the negative controls showed any positive staining.
The strongest signal for mRNA staining was observed in the tissue samples fixed for 24 hr. In all the tissues fixed for 48 hr in formalin, the numbers of labeled cells were significantly lower (more than 50% less). The signal was completely undetectable in tissue samples fixed for 72 hr (Table 1). Therefore, all counts for the correlation study were performed using serial sections obtained only from the tissue samples fixed for 24 hr in formalin.
Anti-BrdU, MIB-5, anti-PCNA, and histone mRNA LIs in the tissues studied are shown in Table 2. On calculating Pearson's correlation coefficient (Pearson's r) on the standardized values in Table 2, the correlation between anti-BrdU and histone mRNA LIs was highly significant, with r=0.5712 and p=0.004. The correlation between anti-BrdU and MIB-5 LIs was also statistically significant at the 1% level (r=0.5159, p=0.01). There was no statistically significant correlation between anti-BrdU and anti-PCNA LIs (r=0.1023, p=0.63) or between anti-BrdU and anti-PCNAS LIs (r=0.0035, p=0.88) (Figure 2) .
The strong correlation between anti-BrdU and histone mRNA LIs throughout all the tissues observed in the study suggests that detectable levels of histone mRNA have no dependence on the cell type and that ISH for histone mRNA is a sensitive and valuable technique for evaluation of proliferating activity in tissue sections. These results are in conformity with the data obtained by other investigators (Alison et al. 1994
The correlation between anti-BrdU and MIB-5 LIs suggests that MIB-5 can reliably detect the growth fraction in rat paraffin-embedded tissues and confirms the results of recent studies on mouse and rat tissues (Ito et al. 1998
Absence of a correlation between anti-BrdU and anti-PCNA LIs or between anti-BrdU and anti-PCNAS LIs in the present study is in agreement with some previous reports in which no correlation between anti-PCNA LI and other indices of proliferation was observed (Jain et al. 1991
Comparison of S-phase LIs between control and treated animals is a commonly used endpoint in cell proliferation studies (Lucas et al. 1998 In conclusion, the results of the present study suggest that both ISH for histone mRNA and IHC with MIB-5 are preferable techniques for assessment of proliferative activity in rat paraffin-embedded renewing tissues compared to PCNA IHC. They can substitute for BrdU IHC when necessary. However, each of them suffers from specific shortcomings: MIB-5 does not label S-phase cells distinctly, and a limitation to the use of ISH for histone mRNA is optimal fixation time.
Received for publication May 22, 2003; accepted July 30, 2003
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