Browsing by Author "Ciccone, Maria"

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    Cancer-associated rs6983267 SNP and its accompanying long noncoding RNA CCAT2 induce myeloid malignancies via unique SNP-specific RNA mutations
    (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2018-04) Shah, Maitri Y.; Ferracin, Manuela; Pileczki, Valentina; Chen, Baoqing; Redis, Roxana; Fabris, Linda; Zhang, Xinna; Ivan, Cristina; Shimizu, Masayoshi; Rodriguez-Aguayo, Cristian; Dragomir, Mihnea; Van Roosbroeck, Katrien; Almeida, Maria Ines; Ciccone, Maria; Nedelcu, Daniela; Cortez, Maria Angelica; Manshouri, Taghi; Calin, Steliana; Muftuoglu, Muharrem; Banerjee, Pinaki P.; Badiwi, Mustafa H.; Parker-Thornburg, Jan; Multani, Asha; Welsh, James William; Estecio, Marcos Roberto; Ling, Hui; Tomuleasa, Ciprian; Dima, Delia; Yang, Hui; Alvarez, Hector; You, M. James; Radovich, Milan; Shpall, Elizabeth; Fabbri, Muller; Rezvani, Katy; Girnita, Leonard; Berindan-Neagoe, Ioana; Maitra, Anirban; Verstovsek, Srdan; Foddle, Riccardo; Bueso-Ramos, Carlos; Gagea, Mihai; Manero, Guillermo Garcia; Calin, Goerge A.; BioHealth Informatics, School of Informatics and Computing
    The cancer-risk-associated rs6983267 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and the accompanying long noncoding RNA CCAT2 in the highly amplified 8q24.21 region have been implicated in cancer predisposition, although causality has not been established. Here, using allele-specific CCAT2 transgenic mice, we demonstrate that CCAT2 overexpression leads to spontaneous myeloid malignancies. We further identified that CCAT2 is overexpressed in bone marrow and peripheral blood of myelodysplastic/myeloproliferative neoplasms (MDS/MPN) patients. CCAT2 induces global deregulation of gene expression by down-regulating EZH2 in vitro and in vivo in an allele-specific manner. We also identified a novel non-APOBEC, non-ADAR, RNA editing at the SNP locus in MDS/MPN patients and CCAT2-transgenic mice. The RNA transcribed from the SNP locus in malignant hematopoietic cells have different allelic composition from the corresponding genomic DNA, a phenomenon rarely observed in normal cells. Our findings provide fundamental insights into the functional role of rs6983267 SNP and CCAT2 in myeloid malignancies.
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    Epstein–Barr Virus MicroRNAs are Expressed in Patients with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia and Correlate with Overall Survival
    (ScienceDirect, 2015-06) Ferrajoli, Alessandra; Ivan, Cristina; Ciccone, Maria; Shimizu, Masayoshi; Kita, Yoshiaki; Ohtsuka, Masahisha; D'Abundo, Lucilla; Qiang, Jun; Lerner, Susan; Nouraee, Nazila; Rabe, Kari G.; Rassenti, Laura Z.; Van Roosbroeck, Katrien; Manning, John T.; Yuan, Yuan; Zhang, Xinna; Shanafelt, Tait D.; Wierda, William G.; Sabbioni, Silvia; Tarrand, Jeffrey J.; Estrov, Zeev; Radovich, Milan; Liang, Han; Negrini, Massimo; Kipps, Thomas J.; Kay, Neil E.; Keating, Michael; Calin, George A.; Department of Surgery, IU School of Medicine
    Although numerous studies highlighted the role of Epstein–Barr Virus (EBV) in B-cell transformation, the involvement of EBV proteins or genome in the development of the most frequent adult leukemia, chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), has not yet been defined. We hypothesized that EBV microRNAs contribute to progression of CLL and demonstrated the presence of EBV miRNAs in B-cells, in paraffin-embedded bone marrow biopsies and in the plasma of patients with CLL by using three different methods (small RNA-sequencing, quantitative reverse transcription PCR [q-RT-PCR] and miRNAs in situ hybridization [miRNA-ISH]). We found that EBV miRNA BHRF1-1 expression levels were significantly higher in the plasma of patients with CLL compared with healthy individuals (p < 0 · 0001). Notably, BHRF1-1 as well as BART4 expression were detected in the plasma of either seronegative or seropositive (anti-EBNA-1 IgG and EBV DNA tested) patients; similarly, miRNA-ISH stained positive in bone marrow specimens while LMP1 and EBER immunohistochemistry failed to detect viral proteins and RNA. We also found that BHRF1-1 plasma expression levels were positively associated with elevated beta-2-microglobulin levels and advanced Rai stages and observed a correlation between higher BHRF1-1 expression levels and shorter survival in two independent patients' cohorts. Furthermore, in the majority of CLL cases where BHRF1-1 was exogenously induced in primary malignant B cells the levels of TP53 were reduced. Our findings suggest that EBV may have a role in the process of disease progression in CLL and that miRNA RT-PCR and miRNAs ISH could represent additional methods to detect EBV miRNAs in patients with CLL.