Interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization and DNA flow cytometry analysis of medulloblastomas with a normal karyotype

Interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) with chromosome 3 and 17 centromeric probes and DNA flow cytometry were used for a retrospective study of nine pediatric medulloblastomas with normal karyotypes after tissue culture. The FISH analysis of medulloblastoma touch preparations showed that in seven of nine tumors, a significant proportion of nuclei had an increased number of centromeric signals for the selected chromosomes. In six of seven cases, this increase was caused by the presence of triploid and tetraploid clones as established by flow cytometry of paraffin-embedded tumors. These findings show that molecular cytogenetic analysis combined with DNA flow cytometry is necessary for all pediatric medulloblastomas diagnosed as cytogenetically normal on cultured tumor tissue.