Distant metastasis is the major cause of cancer-related deaths in men with prostate cancer (PCa). An in vivo functional screen was used to identify microRNAs (miRNAs) regulating metastatic ...dissemination of PCa cells. PC3 cells transduced with pooled miRZiP™ lentivirus library (anti-miRNAs) were injected intraprostatic to 13 NSG mice followed by targeted barcode/anti-miR sequencing. PCa cells in the primary tumours showed a homogenous pattern of anti-miRNAs, but different anti-miRNAs were enriched in liver, lung, and bone marrow, with anti-miR-379 highly enriched in the latter. The bone metastasis-promoting phenotype induced by decreased miR-379 levels was also confirmed in a less metastatic PCa cell line, 22Rv1, where all mice injected intracardially with anti-miR-379-22Rv1 cells developed bone metastases. The levels of miR-379 were found to be lower in bone metastases compared to primary tumours and non-cancerous prostatic tissue in a patient cohort. In vitro functional studies suggested that the mechanism of action was that reduced levels of miR-379 gave an increased colony formation capacity in conditions mimicking the bone microenvironment. In conclusion, our data suggest that specific miRNAs affect the establishment of primary tumours and metastatic dissemination, with a loss of miR-379 promoting metastases in bone.
is the most commonly mutated tumor suppressor gene and its mutation drives tumorigenesis. Using ChIP-seq for p53 in the absence of acute cell stress, we found that wild-type but not mutant p53 binds ...and activates numerous tumor suppressor genes, including
, and
through consensus binding sites in enhancers and promoters. Depletion of p53 reduced expression of these target genes, and analysis across 18 tumor types showed that mutation of
associated with reduced expression of many of these genes. Regarding PTEN, p53 activated expression of a luciferase reporter gene containing the p53-consensus site in the
enhancer, and homozygous deletion of this region in cells decreased PTEN expression and increased growth and transformation. These findings show that p53 maintains expression of a team of tumor suppressor genes that may together with the stress-induced targets mediate the ability of p53 to suppress cancer development. p53 mutations selected during tumor initiation and progression, thus, inactivate multiple tumor suppressor genes in parallel, which could account for the high frequency of p53 mutations in cancer.
In this study, we investigate the activities of p53 under normal low-stress conditions and discover that p53 is capable of maintaining the expression of a group of important tumor suppressor genes at baseline, many of which are haploinsufficient, which could contribute to p53-mediated tumor suppression.
.
Multigene expression signatures provide a molecular subdivision of early breast cancer associated with patient outcome. A gap remains in the validation of such signatures in clinical treatment groups ...of patients within population-based cohorts of unselected primary breast cancer representing contemporary disease stages and current treatments. A cohort of 3520 resectable breast cancers with RNA sequencing data included in the population-based SCAN-B initiative (ClinicalTrials.gov ID NCT02306096) were selected from a healthcare background population of 8587 patients diagnosed within the years 2010-2015. RNA profiles were classified according to 19 reported gene signatures including both gene expression subtypes (e.g. PAM50, IC10, CIT) and risk predictors (e.g. Oncotype DX, 70-gene, ROR). Classifications were analyzed in nine adjuvant clinical assessment groups: TNBC-ACT (adjuvant chemotherapy, n = 239), TNBC-untreated (n = 82), HER2+/ER- with anti-HER2+ ACT treatment (n = 110), HER2+/ER+ with anti-HER2 + ACT + endocrine treatment (n = 239), ER+/HER2-/LN- with endocrine treatment (n = 1113), ER+/HER2-/LN- with endocrine + ACT treatment (n = 243), ER+/HER2-/LN+ with endocrine treatment (n = 423), ER+/HER2-/LN+ with endocrine + ACT treatment (n = 433), and ER+/HER2-/LN- untreated (n = 200). Gene signature classification (e.g., proportion low-, high-risk) was generally well aligned with stratification based on current immunohistochemistry-based clinical practice. Most signatures did not provide any further risk stratification in TNBC and HER2+/ER- disease. Risk classifier agreement (low-, medium/intermediate-, high-risk groups) in ER+ assessment groups was on average 50-60% with occasional pair-wise comparisons having <30% agreement. Disregarding the intermediate-risk groups, the exact agreement between low- and high-risk groups was on average ~80-95%, for risk prediction signatures across all assessment groups. Outcome analyses were restricted to assessment groups of TNBC-ACT and endocrine treated ER+/HER2-/LN- and ER+/HER2-/LN+ cases. For ER+/HER2- disease, gene signatures appear to contribute additional prognostic value even at a relatively short follow-up time. Less apparent prognostic value was observed in the other groups for the tested signatures. The current study supports the usage of gene expression signatures in specific clinical treatment groups within population-based breast cancer. It also stresses the need of further development to reach higher consensus in individual patient classifications, especially for intermediate-risk patients, and the targeting of patients where current gene signatures and prognostic variables provide little support in clinical decision-making.
Three quarters of all breast cancers express the estrogen receptor (ER, ESR1 gene), which promotes tumor growth and constitutes a direct target for endocrine therapies. ESR1 mutations have been ...implicated in therapy resistance in metastatic breast cancer, in particular to aromatase inhibitors. ESR1 mutations promote constitutive ER activity and affect other signaling pathways, allowing cancer cells to proliferate by employing mechanisms within and without direct regulation by the ER. Although subjected to extensive genetic and transcriptomic analyses, understanding of protein alterations remains poorly investigated. Towards this, we employed an integrated mass spectrometry based proteomic approach to profile the protein and phosphoprotein differences in breast cancer cell lines expressing the frequent Y537N and Y537S ER mutations. Global proteome analysis revealed enrichment of mitotic and immune signaling pathways in ER mutant cells, while phosphoprotein analysis evidenced enriched activity of proliferation associated kinases, in particular CDKs and mTOR. Integration of protein expression and phosphorylation data revealed pathway-dependent discrepancies (motility vs proliferation) that were observed at varying degrees across mutant and wt ER cells. Additionally, protein expression and phosphorylation patterns, while under different regulation, still recapitulated the estrogen-independent phenotype of ER mutant cells. Our study is the first proteome-centric characterization of ESR1 mutant models, out of which we confirm estrogen independence of ER mutants and reveal the enrichment of immune signaling pathways at the proteomic level.
TopHat is a popular spliced junction mapper for RNA sequencing data, and writes files in the BAM format - the binary version of the Sequence Alignment/Map (SAM) format. BAM is the standard exchange ...format for aligned sequencing reads, thus correct format implementation is paramount for software interoperability and correct analysis. However, TopHat writes its unmapped reads in a way that is not compatible with other software that implements the SAM/BAM format.
We have developed TopHat-Recondition, a post-processor for TopHat unmapped reads that restores read information in the proper format. TopHat-Recondition thus enables downstream software to process the plethora of BAM files written by TopHat.
TopHat-Recondition can repair unmapped read files written by TopHat and is freely available under a 2-clause BSD license on GitHub: https://github.com/cbrueffer/tophat-recondition .
Abstract
Background
Breast cancer is, despite screening, not always detected early enough and is together with other tumor types known to shed genetic information in circulation. Unlike single-copy ...nuclear DNA, mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) copies range from 100s to 10,000s per cell, thus providing a potentially alternative to identify potential missing cancer information in circulation at an early stage.
Methods
To characterize mitochondrial mutation landscapes in breast cancer, whole mtDNA sequencing and bioinformatics analyses were performed on 86 breast cancer biopsies and 50 available matched baseline cancer-free whole blood samples from the same individuals, selected from a cohort of middle-aged women in Sweden. To determine whether the mutations can be detected in blood plasma prior to cancer diagnosis, we further designed a nested case-control study (n = 663) and validated the shortlisted mutations using droplet digital PCR.
Results
We detected different mutation landscapes between biopsies and matched whole blood samples. Compared to whole blood samples, mtDNA from biopsies had higher heteroplasmic mutations in the D-loop region (
P
= 0.02),
RNR2
(
P
= 0.005),
COX1
(
P
= 0.037) and
CYTB
(
P
= 0.006). Furthermore, the germline mtDNA mutations had higher heteroplasmy level than the lost (
P
= 0.002) and de novo mutations (
P
= 0.04). The nonsynonymous to synonymous substitution ratio (dN/dS) was higher for the heteroplasmic mutations (
P
= 7.25 × 10
−12
) than that for the homoplasmic mutations, but the de novo (
P
= 0.06) and lost mutations (
P
= 0.03) had lower dN/dS than the germline mutations. Interestingly, we found that the critical regions for mitochondrial transcription: MT-HSP1 (odds ratio OR: 21.41), MT-TFH (OR: 7.70) and MT-TAS2 (OR: 3.62), had significantly higher heteroplasmic mutations than the rest of the D-loop sub-regions. Finally, we found that the presence of mt.16093T > C mutation increases 67% risk of developing breast cancer.
Conclusions
Our findings show that mitochondrial genetic landscape changes during cancer pathogenesis and positive selection of mtDNA heteroplasmic mutations in breast cancer. Most importantly, the mitochondrial mutations identified in biopsies can be traced back in matched plasma samples and could potentially be used as early breast cancer diagnostic biomarkers.
Background/Aim: Circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), which is shed from cancer cells into the bloodstream, offers a potential minimally invasive approach for cancer diagnosis and monitoring. This research ...aimed to assess the preoperative ctDNA levels in ovarian tumors patients' plasma and establish correlations with clinicopathological parameters and patient prognosis.
The microarray technique requires the organization and analysis of vast amounts of data. These data include information about the samples hybridized, the hybridization images and their extracted data ...matrices, and information about the physical array, the features and reporter molecules. We present a web-based customizable bioinformatics solution called BioArray Software Environment (BASE) for the management and analysis of all areas of microarray experimentation. All software necessary to run a local server is freely available.
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