To determine if anti-CENP-A antibodies could be primed by an overexpression of this
protein, we used indirect ELISAs to screen sera from 196 patients with different types of cancer,
namely colon, breast, lung, biliopancreatic, esophagogastric and genitourinary cancers (Fig. 2).
For comparison, we also screened SSc patients known to have either ACA or ATA, and healthy
controls. A high concentration of anti-CENP-A antibodies, comparable with those in ACApositive
SSc patients, was detected in only one patient with breast cancer. These findings indicate
that CENP-A overexpression per se is not sufficient to bypass CENP-A tolerance, and that other
mechanisms, probably tied to a pathogenetic process, are responsible for the generation of anti-
CENP-A antibodies.