A METHOD OF ANALYSING, A REARRANGED IMMUNOGLOBULIN OR T CELL RECEPTOR VARIABLE REGION GENE

摘要

The present invention relates to a method of characterizing a nucleic acid region and, more particularly, to a method of analyzing a marker nucleic acid region. The method of the present invention is based on identification of one or both of the nucleic acid regions flanking a marker nucleic acid region and provides a means of analyzing a marker nucleic acid region which is characteristic of a clonal population of cells. The method of the present invention is useful in the context of enabling a range of applications including, but not limited to, monitoring the progression of a condition characterized by the presence of a clonal populations of cells (such as a neoplastic condition), monitoring the levels of one or more clonal cell population, predicting the likelihood of a subject's relapse from a remissive state to a disease state, for assessing the effectiveness of existing therapeutic drugs and/ or new therapeutic agents and identifying the presence of a marker region.