Measurement of Cytokine and Chemokine Gene Expression Patterns Using cDNA Array

The purpose of the gene array techniques is to simultaneously analyze the expression or characteristics of a large number of genes (1 –3 ). These techniques can be used to compare gene expression in various cells or in the same cells following various treatments, to analyze function of multiple genes sequenced in the human and other genome projects, to discover new genes, to detect mutations or gene polymorphism, to identify genes responsible for disease processes, to diagnose diseases, to monitor therapy, or to develop new therapies (1 –17 ). When the human genome project is completed and when the entire human cDNA library becomes available on an array, it will be possible to identify all the genes that are expressed in a given cell type.