Project description:Purpose was to determine whether varying gestational trophoblastic disease samples exhibit differences in RNA expression and fusion transcripts.
Project description:The term gestational trophoblastic disease (GTD) describes a range of pathologies derived from the villous trophoblasts of the placenta. These include benign entities such as partial and complete hydatidiform mole as well as invasive cancers such as gestational choriocarcinoma, placental site trophoblastic tumors, and epithelioid trophoblastic tumors. Collectively, the malignant forms of GTD are known as gestational trophoblastic neoplasia (GTN). The risk of GTN following a complete molar pregnancy ranges between 8-25%. Low risk patients are expected to have a high likelihood of response to single agent chemotherapy with methotrexate or actinomycin D, but the incidence of resistance to single agent chemotherapy among low risk patients remains 25-50%. We used gene expression microarrays to compare methotrexate sensitive trophoblastic cell lines to sublines that were conditioned to become methotrexate resistant.
Project description:Gestational choriocarcinoma arises from the cells of conception and is usually characterized as a fast growing, invasive and aggressive malignancy. The overall incidence is approximately 1 case per 50,000 pregnancies and aside from increasing maternal age does not appear to have any other risk factors. In contrast to most malignancies, gestational choriocarcinoma is frequently treated on a clinical diagnosis without a biopsy and therefore tumor samples of sufficient quantity to permit detailed genetic analysis are exceptionally rare. As a result, no previous whole genome sequencing or methylation studies have been reported for this rare diagnosis. With the aim of investigating the potential contribution of epigenetic changes to the pathogenesis of this rare malignancy, we have performed a methylation analysis from routine processed FFPE material in a case of intra-placental choriocarcinoma.