The increase of Lewis x and Sialyl Lewis x epitopes on the surface of cancer cells was known for decades. alpha(1, 3) FuT is the key enzyme in the biosynthesis of these epitopes. The increase of the activity of this enzyme was actually found in many cancer tissues, cancer cell lines and She serum of the cancer patients. The recent cloning of the enzyme led to the possibility of the application of the sensitive methods with small amount of tissues to detect the expression of the gene. In this paper, probes for alpha(1, 3) FuT type III, V and VI were prepared, they are 447, 486 and 443bp in length respectively. The DIG-labeled probe (type V) was used to detect the mRNA of the enzyme by in situ hybridization. Surgical samples from. five patients with metastatic lesions, five cases without metastasis and two normal liver tissue from liver angioma patients were examined. The alpha(1, 3) FuT mRNA level was highest in samples with the metastatic lesion, lowest in normal tissues and those of the original tumor lesion in between. The difference is very distinct. The possibility of the method to be used in evaluating the prognosis of the disease is discussed.
