2014年12月12日 訊 /生物谷BIOON/ --乳腺癌是女性常患的一種癌症,九分之一的個體在其一生中都會發生乳腺癌,而乳腺癌的早期預防及診斷以及術後化療方法的使用都可以有效增加患者在未來10年內的生存率。
近日,發表在國際雜誌Molecular Oncology上的一篇研究論文中,來自巴塞隆納大學等處的研究人員通過研究建立了乳腺癌的表觀遺傳模式以及其相應的臨床結果;高風險乳腺癌患者的鑑別對於知曉患者是否需要通過外科手術移除腫瘤或者是否需要進行化療藥物來治療非常關鍵。當前研究者可以確定引發乳腺癌的遺傳突變及基因表達模式,但是解析疾病的遺傳學謎底卻仍然是一項非常艱巨的任務。
研究者Esteller表示,我們分析了500例乳腺癌腫瘤組織中DNA甲基化的改變情況,並且將這些樣本的甲基化模式同癌症相關的臨床行為進行對比;根據表觀基因組可以將乳腺腫瘤分為兩個亞群,第一個為Epi-Basal,其主要特點是促使染色體破碎的外基因標記缺失,而另外一個亞群則為Epi-Luminal B,其主要特點為基因的遺傳失活或許可以保護個體免於癌症侵襲,以及這些改變的細胞或許失去了保護個體的作用。
研究者指出,Epi-Luminal B亞群腫瘤往往會表現出惡化的形式,而且其和患者的生存率下降直接相關,這或許可以指導臨床醫生們不能對這一類腫瘤進行外科手術,而且需要進行輔助化學療法來抑制病情的惡化發展,換句話說在良好遺傳學模式的腫瘤組織中,外科手術或許就是治癒性的療法,其可以避免化療方法帶來的機體副作用的發生。(生物谷Bioon.com)
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A DNA methylation-based definition of biologically distinct breast cancer subtypes
Olafur A. Stefansson, Sebastian Moran, Antonio Gomez, Sergi Sayols, Carlos Arribas-Jorba, Juan Sandoval, Holmfridur Hilmarsdottir, Elinborg Olafsdottir, Laufey Tryggvadottir, Jon G. Jonasson, Jorunn Eyfjord, Manel Esteller
In cancer, epigenetic states are deregulated and thought to be of significance in cancer development and progression. We explored DNA methylation-based signatures in association with breast cancer subtypes to assess their impact on clinical presentation and patient prognosis. DNA methylation was analyzed using Infinium 450K arrays in 40 tumors and 17 normal breast samples, together with DNA copy number changes and subtype-specific markers by tissue microarrays. The identified methylation signatures were validated against a cohort of 212 tumors annotated for breast cancer subtypes by the PAM50 method (The Cancer Genome Atlas). Selected markers were pyrosequenced in an independent validation cohort of 310 tumors and analyzed with respect to survival, clinical stage and grade. The results demonstrate that DNA methylation patterns linked to the luminal-B subtype are characterized by CpG island promoter methylation events. In contrast, a large fraction of basal-like tumors are characterized by hypomethylation events occurring within the gene body. Based on these hallmark signatures, we defined two DNA methylation-based subtypes, Epi-LumB and Epi-Basal, and show that they are associated with unfavorable clinical parameters and reduced survival. Our data show that distinct mechanisms leading to changes in CpG methylation states are operative in different breast cancer subtypes. Importantly, we show that a few selected proxy markers can be used to detect the distinct DNA methylation-based subtypes thereby providing valuable information on disease prognosis.