Browsing by Author "Pasche, Boris"

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    Comprehensive and Computable Molecular Diagnostic Panel (C2Dx) From Small Volume Specimens for Precision Oncology: Molecular Subtyping of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer From Fine Needle Aspirates
    (Frontiers Media, 2021-04-16) Su, Jing; Huang, Lynn S.; Barnard, Ryan; Parks, Graham; Cappellari, James; Bellinger, Christina; Dotson, Travis; Craddock, Lou; Prakash, Bharat; Hovda, Jonathan; Clark, Hollins; Petty, William Jeffrey; Pasche, Boris; Chan, Michael D.; Miller, Lance D.; Ruiz, Jimmy; Biostatistics, School of Public Health
    The Comprehensive, Computable NanoString Diagnostic gene panel (C2Dx) is a promising solution to address the need for a molecular pathological research and diagnostic tool for precision oncology utilizing small volume tumor specimens. We translate subtyping-related gene expression patterns of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) derived from public transcriptomic data which establish a highly robust and accurate subtyping system. The C2Dx demonstrates supreme performance on the NanoString platform using microgram-level FNA samples and has excellent portability to frozen tissues and RNA-Seq transcriptomic data. This workflow shows great potential for research and the clinical practice of cancer molecular diagnosis.
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    Multi-Omics Analysis of Brain Metastasis Outcomes Following Craniotomy
    (Frontiers Media, 2021-04-06) Su, Jing; Song, Qianqian; Qasem, Shadi; O’Neill, Stacey; Lee, Jingyun; Furdui, Cristina M.; Pasche, Boris; Metheny-Barlow, Linda; Masters, Adrianna H.; Lo, Hui-Wen; Xing, Fei; Watabe, Kounosuke; Miller, Lance D.; Tatter, Stephen B.; Laxton, Adrian W.; Whitlow, Christopher T.; Chan, Michael D.; Soike, Michael H.; Ruiz, Jimmy; Biostatistics, School of Public Health
    Background: The incidence of brain metastasis continues to increase as therapeutic strategies have improved for a number of solid tumors. The presence of brain metastasis is associated with worse prognosis but it is unclear if distinctive biomarkers can separate patients at risk for CNS related death. Methods: We executed a single institution retrospective collection of brain metastasis from patients who were diagnosed with lung, breast, and other primary tumors. The brain metastatic samples were sent for RNA sequencing, proteomic and metabolomic analysis of brain metastasis. The primary outcome was distant brain failure after definitive therapies that included craniotomy resection and radiation to surgical bed. Novel prognostic subtypes were discovered using transcriptomic data and sparse non-negative matrix factorization. Results: We discovered two molecular subtypes showing statistically significant differential prognosis irrespective of tumor subtype. The median survival time of the good and the poor prognostic subtypes were 7.89 and 42.27 months, respectively. Further integrated characterization and analysis of these two distinctive prognostic subtypes using transcriptomic, proteomic, and metabolomic molecular profiles of patients identified key pathways and metabolites. The analysis suggested that immune microenvironment landscape as well as proliferation and migration signaling pathways may be responsible to the observed survival difference. Conclusion: A multi-omics approach to characterization of brain metastasis provides an opportunity to identify clinically impactful biomarkers and associated prognostic subtypes and generate provocative integrative understanding of disease.
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    TGLI1 transcription factor mediates breast cancer brain metastasis via activating metastasis-initiating cancer stem cells and astrocytes in the tumor microenvironment
    (Springer Nature, 2020-01) Sirkisoon, Sherona R.; Carpenter, Richard L.; Rimkus, Tadas; Doheny, Daniel; Zhu, Dongqin; Aguayo, Noah R.; Xing, Fei; Chan, Michael; Ruiz, Jimmy; Metheny-Barlow, Linda J.; Strowd, Roy; Lin, Jiayuh; Pasche, Boris; Debinski, Waldemar; Watabe, Kounosuke; Lo, Hui-Wen; Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine
    Mechanisms for breast cancer metastasis remain unclear. Whether truncated glioma-associated oncogene homolog 1 (TGLI1), a transcription factor known to promote angiogenesis, migration and invasion, plays any role in metastasis of any tumor type has never been investigated. In this study, results of two mouse models of breast cancer metastasis showed that ectopic expression of TGLI1, but not GLI1, promoted preferential metastasis to the brain. Conversely, selective TGLI1 knockdown using antisense oligonucleotides led to decreased breast cancer brain metastasis (BCBM) in vivo. Immunohistochemical staining showed that TGLI1, but not GLI1, was increased in lymph node metastases compared to matched primary tumors, and that TGLI1 was expressed at higher levels in BCBM specimens compared to primary tumors. TGLI1 activation is associated with a shortened time to develop BCBM and enriched in HER2-enriched and triple-negative breast cancers. Radioresistant BCBM cell lines and specimens expressed higher levels of TGLI1, but not GLI1, than radiosensitive counterparts. Since cancer stem cells (CSCs) are radioresistant and metastasis-initiating cells, we examined TGLI1 for its involvement in breast CSCs and found TGLI1 to transcriptionally activate stemness genes CD44, Nanog, Sox2, and OCT4 leading to CSC renewal, and TGLI1 outcompetes with GLI1 for binding to target promoters. We next examined whether astrocyte-priming underlies TGLI1-mediated brain tropism and found that TGLI1-positive CSCs strongly activated and interacted with astrocytes in vitro and in vivo. These findings demonstrate, for the first time, that TGLI1 mediates breast cancer metastasis to the brain, in part, through promoting metastasis-initiating CSCs and activating astrocytes in BCBM microenvironment.