Basics: TMA

Ákos Ágyi

Technical sales representative

What is TMA? (1)

• Combines tens to hundreds of paraffin embedded

tissue specimens into a single paraffin block

• Tissue cores are extracted from one or more

representative regions of a paraffinembedded

tissue block (donor block)

• Then precisely arrayed into a new “recipient”

paraffin block

What is TMA? (2)

• Tissue microarray

How to make a TMA Block? (1)

How to make a TMA Block? (2)

• Manual moulding

• Manual punching

• Time consuming

• Low density TMA

How to make a TMA Block? (3)

How to make a TMA Block? (5)

How to make a TMA Block? (4)

How to make a TMA Block? (6)

• Computer controlled

• Drilling

• Punching

• Sample insertion

• Fast and precise

• High density TMA

TMA sectioning and staining

Analysis of TMA slides (1)

• Computer image

scoring

• Easy comparison of

tissue samples

• Digital imaging help

to alleviate previous

bottlenecks, in the

research pipeline

Analysis of TMA slides (2)

Applications of Tissue microarrays (1)

• All the histochemical

and molecular detection

techniques (developed

for regular sections)

works with TMA

sections

Applications of Tissue microarrays (2)

• In cancer research:

• Prevalence TMAs

• analyze the frequency of a molecular alteration in different tumor types

• Progression TMAs

• study the role of a marker in tumor initiation, progression, or metastatic growth

• Prognosis TMAs

• contain tissues with patient follow-up data.

• TMAs are used for many noncancer applications:

• Alzheimer's research

• Inflammatory disease research

Applications of Tissue microarrays (3)

• Clinical pathology workflow, ex. routine diagnostics

of breast pathology

• Immunohistochemistry quality control and quality

assurance

• Biomarker discovery and validation processes

• Discovery of potential molecular targets for gene-

specific therapy

Possible customers for TMA products

• Bio-banks

• Research laboratories

• Pathology departments in hospitals

• Pharmaceutical companies

TMA Laboratory equipment from 3DHISTECH

Tissue Microarrayers

Tissue preparation tools

Digital slide scanners and TMA analysis software

Tomorrow morning, 09:15 - 10:00

• Recent developments

in TMA Grand Master

and TMA Master

control software

Thank you for your kind attention!

akos.agyi@3dhistech.com