Expression profiling by high throughput sequencing of tumors derived from human prostate epithelial cells transformed with the oncogenes N-Myc and myrAKT1.
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ABSTRACT: MYCN amplification and overexpression are common in neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC). However, the impact of aberrant N-Myc expression in prostate tumorigenesis and the cellular origin of NEPC have not been established. We define N-Myc and activated AKT1 as oncogenic components sufficient to transform human prostate epithelial cells to prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC including the small cell prostate carcinoma (SCPC) variant with phenotypic and molecular features of aggressive, late-stage human disease. We directly show that prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC can both arise from a common epithelial clone. Further, N-Myc is required for tumor maintenance and destabilization of N-Myc through Aurora A kinase inhibition reduces tumor burden. Our findings establish N-Myc as a driver of NEPC and a target for therapeutic intervention. Expression profiling by high throughput sequencing of experimentally generated human tumors with mixed NEPC and prostate adenocarcinoma. Gene expression analysis of laser capture microdissected NEPC and adenocarcinoma from three independent engineered human tumors of mixed NEPC and prostate adenocarcinoma phenotype.
Project description:MYCN amplification and overexpression are common in neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC). However, the impact of aberrant N-Myc expression in prostate tumorigenesis and the cellular origin of NEPC have not been established. We define N-Myc and activated AKT1 as oncogenic components sufficient to transform human prostate epithelial cells to prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC including the small cell prostate carcinoma (SCPC) variant with phenotypic and molecular features of aggressive, late-stage human disease. We directly show that prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC can both arise from a common epithelial clone. Further, N-Myc is required for tumor maintenance and destabilization of N-Myc through Aurora A kinase inhibition reduces tumor burden. Our findings establish N-Myc as a driver of NEPC and a target for therapeutic intervention. Expression profiling by high throughput sequencing of experimentally generated human tumors with mixed NEPC and prostate adenocarcinoma.
Project description:Key histological and growth progression characteristics of human prostate cancer are phenocopied in mouse models that have been subjected to androgen level depletion and engineered for hemizygosity of candidate prostate cancer tumor suppressor genes Nkx3.1 and Pten. To characterize their relative transcriptomes and identify a genomic basis for their relevance to human prostate cancers, we compared mouse prostate tumors expression profiles to those from a panel of human prostate cancer isolates and to normal and benign prostates. Human prostate cancers and mouse prostate tumor models both exhibit the activation of genes associated with growth, cell cycle control, and inhibition of differentiation (CDKN2A, CDKN2B, CDKN2C, CEBPB, CEBPG, CSF1, CTSS, DMBT1, EGFR, PLCG2, PXN, SPP1, TNFSF9), and conversely, diminished expression of genes associated with normal prostate differentiation and function. All tumors also exhibit dysregulated expression of genes associated with inflammation, the disruption of prostate-associated ER stress pathways, as well as with oxidative stress, energy metabolism, cell adhesion, and stress response. Immunoinflammatory and altered cell adhesion process-associated genes exhibited prominent expression in early stage tumors. In contrast, metastatic human prostate cancer samples eliminated the expression of most immunoinflammatory-associated transcripts. Cross-species comparisons of molecular programs that are shared or distinguishing of Nkx3.1; Pten mutant mouse models and human adenocarcinomas clearly delineate core tumorigenesis programs associated with cell cycle activation and loss of differentiation. Compared to locally spreading mouse and human tumors, metastatic prostate cancer exhibits greatly reduced expression of immunoinflammatory and adhesion genes, implying that immuno-inflammatory activation may enable first stages of tumorogenesis, but suppress metastasis. These results provide a novel framework to identify stage-specific biomarkers and candidate targets for combinatorial therapeutics. The complex role of inflammation suggests a need for additional caution in countering metastasis. Keywords: tumor stage 26 Affymetrix MOE430A microarrays
Project description:MYCN amplification and overexpression are common in neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC). However, the impact of aberrant N-Myc expression in prostate tumorigenesis and the cellular origin of NEPC have not been established. We define N-Myc and activated AKT1 as oncogenic components sufficient to transform human prostate epithelial cells to prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC including the small cell prostate carcinoma (SCPC) variant with phenotypic and molecular features of aggressive, late-stage human disease. We directly show that prostate adenocarcinoma and NEPC can both arise from a common epithelial clone. Further, N-Myc is required for tumor maintenance and destabilization of N-Myc through Aurora A kinase inhibition reduces tumor burden. Our findings establish N-Myc as a driver of NEPC and a target for therapeutic intervention. SNP array data of experimentally generated human NEPC tumors and a cell line.
Project description:Primary tumor growth induces host tissue responses that are believed to support and promote tumor progression. Identification of the molecular characteristics of the tumor microenvironment and elucidation of its crosstalk with tumor cells may therefore be crucial for improving our understanding of the processes implicated in cancer progression, identifying potential therapeutic targets, and uncovering stromal gene expression signatures that may predict clinical outcome. A key issue to resolve, therefore, is whether the stromal response to tumor growth is largely a generic phenomenon, irrespective of the tumor type, or whether the response reflects tumor-specific properties. To address similarity or distinction of stromal gene expression changes during cancer progression, oligonucleotide-based Affymetrix microarray technology was used to compare the transcriptomes of laser-microdissected stromal cells derived from invasive human breast and prostate carcinoma. Invasive breast and prostate cancer-associated stroma was observed to display distinct transcriptomes, with a limited number of shared genes. Interestingly, both breast and prostate tumor-specific dysregulated stromal genes were observed to cluster breast and prostate cancer patients, respectively, into two distinct groups with statistically different clinical outcomes. By contrast, a gene signature that was common to the reactive stroma of both tumor types did not have survival predictive value. Univariate Cox analysis identified genes whose expression level was most strongly associated with patient survival. Taken together, these observations suggest that the tumor microenvironment displays distinct features according to the tumor type that provides survival-predictive value. 6 samples of stroma surrounding invasive breast primary tumors; 6 matched samples of normal stroma. 6 samples of stroma surrounding invasive prostate primary tumors; 6 matched samples of normal stroma.
Project description:Gene expression analyses of pancreatic adenocarcinoma and adjacent ductal epithelia from the same patient using bulk vs LCM dissected samples. Our results indicate that laser capture microdissection (LCM) is necessary to identify differentially expressed genes that discriminate between PDAC and healthy pancreatic ductal tissue. Pancreatic tissues were collected at time of surgery and snap frozen in liquid nitrogen for RNA extraction and Affymetrix GeneChip Expression analyses.
Project description:Engrailed homeoproteins are expressed in adult dopaminergic neurons of the substantia nigra. In Engrailed1 heterozygous mice, these neurons start dying at 6 weeks, are more sensitive to oxidative stress and progressively develop traits similar to those observed following an acute and strong oxidative stress inflected to wild-type neurons. These changes include DNA strand breaks and the modification (intensity and distribution) of several nuclear and nucleolar heterochromatin marks. Engrailed1 and Engrailed2 are biochemically equivalent transducing proteins previously used to antagonize dopaminergic neuron death in Engrailed heterozygous mice and in mouse models of Parkinson disease. Accordingly, we show that, following an acute oxidative stress, a single Engrailed2 injection restores all nuclear and nucleolar heterochromatin marks, decreases the number of DNA strand breaks and protects dopaminergic neurons against apoptosis. RNA-seq data for differentially expressed genes in the SNpc of En1+/- mice, En2 infused mice and 6-OHDA/En2 injection experiments.
Project description:To identify molecular changes underlying the chemopreventive or tumor promoting effects of SRD5A inhibition, we profiled gene expression changes in benign prostate epithelium from patients with PCa treated with dutasteride, a dual SRD5A inhibitor. Subjects were aged 45-80 years with clinically localized PCa (T1C to T2b), Gleason score <7, and serum PSA 2.5-10 ng/dL. 81 men were randomized to immediate RP (n=25) or to dutasterdie at 0.5 mg (n=26) or 3.5 mg (n=24) orally per day for four months prior to RP. Prostate samples embedded in OCT were used for laser capture microdissection (LCM). Keywords: clinical trial, Dutasteride, PEDB, dose response, prostate cancer, microarray Subjects were aged 45-80 years with clinically localized PCa (T1C to T2b), Gleason score <7, and serum PSA 2.5-10 ng/dL. 81 men were randomized to immediate RP (n=25) or to dutasterdie at 0.5 mg (n=26) or 3.5 mg (n=24) orally per day for four months prior to RP. Prostate samples embedded in OCT were used for laser capture microdissection (LCM). Approximately 2000-3000 epithelial cells per sample were collected from 8µm sections using the Arcturus Veritas™ Laser Capture Microdissection System according to the Arcturus HistoGene LCM Frozen Section Staining Kit Protocol (Mountain View, CA). Total RNA was isolated using the Arcturus Picopure™ Kit, and the samples were treated with DNAse using the Qiagen RNase-Free DNase Set (Qiagen Inc, Valencia, CA). Total RNA was subjected to two rounds of linear amplification using the Ambion MessageAmpII Kit (Ambion Inc, Austin, TX), quantitated in a Gene-Spec III spectrophotometer (Hitachi, Tokyo) and aRNA integrity evaluated using gel electrophoresis. 40 Human Prostate (PEDB) Microarrays were run with sample on the Cy3 channel against a Human Gold Standard (v5) on the Cy5 channel.
Project description:Exclusion of cancer patients with brain metastases from clinical trials is a major cause of the limited therapeutic options available for secondary brain tumors. Here, we report a novel drug-screening platform (METPlatform) based on organotypic cultures that allows identifying anti-metastatic compounds in a preparation that includes the tumor microenvironment. By applying this approach to brain metastasis, we identified HSP90 as a promising therapeutic target. A blood-brain barrier permeable HSP90 inhibitor showed high potency against mouse and human brain metastases from melanoma, lung and breast adenocarcinoma with distinct oncogenomic profiles at clinically relevant stages of the disease, including a novel model of local relapse after neurosurgery. Furthermore, in situ proteomic analysis of brain metastases treated with the chaperone inhibitor revealed non-canonical clients of HSP90 as potential novel mediators of brain metastasis and actionable mechanisms of resistance driven by autophagy. Our work validates METPlatform as a potent resource for metastasis research integrating drug-screening and unbiased omic approaches that is fully compatible with human samples. We envision that METPlatform could be established as a clinically relevant strategy to personalize the management of metastatic disease in the brain and elsewhere.
Project description:The transition from castration resistant prostate adenocarcinoma (CRPC) to neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC) is emerging as an important mechanism of treatment resistance. NEPC are associated with over-expression and gene amplification of MYCN (encoding N-Myc). N-Myc is a bona fide driver oncogene in several rare tumor types, but its role in prostate cancer progression is not well established. Integrating a novel genetically engineered mouse model and human prostate cancer transcriptome data, we show that N-Myc over-expression leads to the development of poorly differentiated, invasive prostate cancer that is molecularly similar to human NEPC tumors which includes an abrogation of AR signaling and induction of Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 signaling and that N-Myc interacts with AR and this interaction depends on Enhancer of Zeste Homolog 2. Altogether, our data shows that N-Myc drives the neuroendocrine phenotype in prostate cancer.
Project description:This is a mathematical describing the interaction between the prostate adenocarcinoma tumor environment, the prostate specific antigen (PSA) produced by hormone-dependent and hormone-independent tumor cells, respectively, and the level of androgens.