Abstract

Craniopharyngiomas are among the most common paediatric tumours and are thought to arise from embryonic remnants of Rathke’s pouch. The molecular mechanisms involved in their formation remain elusive and little is known about chromosomal imbalances that could suggest the locations of tumour suppressor or proto-oncogenes involved in the pathogenesis. The paucity of published data on the molecular basis of such tumours prompted this investigation of 20 adamantinomatous and nine papillary craniopharyngiomas for genetic abnormalities by comparative genomic hybridisation (CGH). CGH revealed no DNA copy number changes in any of the 29 primary craniopharyngiomas, regardless of their histological subtype. These data suggest that chromosomal imbalances are a rare event in both adamantinomatous and papillary craniopharyngiomas.