Project description:Pancreatic cancer is characterized by abundant desmoplastic stroma. Despite numerous theoretical and experimental efforts, therapeutic approaches targeting pancreatic cancer stroma have been largely unsuccessful, highlighting the need for more comprehensive assessment of inter- and intratumoral stromal heterogeneity in a large series of clinical tumors. Quantitative computation of FAP-dominant fibroblasts, ACTA2-dominant fibroblasts, and intratumoral collagen in whole-tissue sections from 215 treatment-naïve pancreatic cancers allowed us to identify three distinct stroma types (FAP-dominant fibroblast-rich stroma [F-stroma], ACTA2-dominant fibroblast-rich stroma [A-stroma], and collgen-rich stroma [C-stroma]), which were differentially associated with patient outcomes, molecular characteristics and the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment. We explored differentially expressed genes between three distinct stroma types (F-stroma, A-stroma, and C-stroma) using frozen samples from 20 patients with pancreatic cancer.
Project description:Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains a lethal disease with a 5-year survival of 4%. A key hallmark of PDAC is extensive stromal involvement, which makes capturing precise tumor-specific molecular information difficult. Here, we have overcome this problem by applying blind source separation to a diverse collection of PDAC gene expression microarray data, which includes primary, metastatic, and normal samples. By digitally separating tumor, stroma, and normal gene expression, we have identified and validated two tumor-specific subtypes including a “basal-like†subtype which has worse outcome, and is molecularly similar to basal tumors in bladder and breast cancer. Furthermore, we define 'normal' and 'activated' stromal subtypes which are independently prognostic. Our results provide new insight into the molecular composition of PDAC which may be used to tailor therapies or provide decision support in a clinical setting where the choice and timing of therapies is critical. Analysis of the landscape of gene expression in pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Data include 145 primary and 61 metastatic PDAC tumors, 17 cell lines, 46 pancreas and 88 distant site adjacent normal samples. Arrays represent distinct samples. The SPOT column in the raw data file (linked to each sample record) contains Agilent feature extraction numbers (included in the 'GPL4133-20424.txt' linked to the platform records).
Project description:Background: Mortality rates of pancreatic cancer remain high, which is mainly due to advanced disease and metastasis. We hypothesized that DNA copy number alteration are enriched in metastatic cells compared to autologous primary tumors, which may inform on cancer-related pathways possibly serving as potential targets for specific therapies. We investigated 18 pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas, including 39 lymph node and 5 distant metastases after surgical resection. Analysis was performed with array-based comparative genomic hybridization. Results: Metastases acquire a higher frequency of CNAs with the highest in distant metastasis (OM: median=42, LNM: median=23, PT: median=17). In LNM, gains were prevalent on chromosome bands 8q11.23-q24.3, 12q14.1, 17p12.1, 21q22.12, and losses on 3p21.31, 4p14, 8p23.3-p11.21,17p12-11.2. Genes on amplified regions are involved in cancer-related pathways such as WNT-signaling, also involved in metastasis. Conclusions: Pancreatic cancers show a high degree of intratumor heterogeneity, which could lead to resistance of chemotherapy and worse outcome. ACGH analysis reveals regions preferentially gained or lost in synchronous metastases encoding for genes involved in cancer-related pathways, which could lead to novel therapeutic opportunities.
Project description:<p>Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDAC) is the 11th most common cancer in the USA but the 4th in fatalities. The onset and progression of cancer is driven by extensive rearrangement and mutation of the genome. We combined our capability to capture and enrich exome DNA with the next generation sequencing capacity to allow us to detect and characterize the somatic mutation profile of 24 patients with PDAC. Patient samples were collected by the Elkins Pancreatic Center in the Baylor College of Medicine Department of Surgery. Sequencing of the pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma is one of the NHGRI Center Initiated Projects in progress in the Human Genome Sequencing Center at Baylor College of Medicine. These data are also contributed to an ICGC study and will be published with the ICGC collaborators.</p>
Project description:Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) has the worst prognosis of all common cancers, but divergent outcomes are apparent between patients. To delineate the intertumor heterogeneity that contributes to this, we aimed to identify clinically distinct gene expression-based subgroups. From a cohort of 345 resected pancreatic cancer cases, 90 samples with confirmed diagnosis of PDAC and sufficient tumor content were available for gene expression analysis by RNA sequencing. Unsupervised classification was applied, and a classifier was constructed. Species-specific transcript analysis on matching patient-derived xenografts (PDX, N=14) allowed construction of tumor- and stroma-specific classifiers for use on PDX models and cell lines.
Project description:Pancreatic cancer stem cells (CSCs) have been described as CD24+/CD44+/EpCAM+ or CD133+ cells. However, no study has determined the co-expression of all of these markers in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. Similarly to other combinations of CSC markers, CD24+/ CD44+/EpCAM+/CD133+ phenotype might more accurately identify true pancreatic CSCs. Therefore, we performed a detailed co-expression analysis of CD24, CD44, EpCAM, and CD133 in 3 cell lines derived from primary pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDACs). Gene expression profiling was applied in order to further investigate the observed differences in proportion of cells that co-expressed CSC markers among the cell lines.