Stat3 modulates chloride channel accessory protein expression in normal and neoplastic mammary tissue

Mammary gland regression at the cessation of lactation (involution) is an exquisitely orchestrated process of cell death and tissue remodelling in which Stat3 signalling has an essential role. The involution microenvironment of the mammary gland is considered to be pro-tumourigenic and a proportion of cases of pregnancy-associated breast cancer are suggested to originate in tandem with involution. However, the apparent paradox that STAT3 is required for cell death in normal mammary gland, but is associated with breast cancer cell survival, has not been resolved. Herein, we investigate Stat3-mediated regulation of expression of members of the calcium-activated chloride channel regulator (CLCA) family of proteins during involution and mammary carcinogenesis. Using the conditionally immortal mammary epithelial cell line KIM-2, together with mice exhibiting mammary epithelial cell-specific deletion of Stat3 during lactation, we demonstrate that expression of mCLCA1 and mCLCA2 is elevated in concert with activation of Stat3. By contrast, murine CLCA5 (mCLCA5), the murine orthologue of human CLCA2, is significantly upregulated at 24, 72 and 96 h of involution in Stat3 knockout mice, suggesting a reciprocal regulation of these proteins by Stat3 in vivo. Interestingly, orthotopic tumours arising from transplantation of 4T1 murine mammary tumour cells exhibit both phosphorylated Stat3 and mCLCA5 expression. However, we demonstrate that expression is highly compartmentalized to distinct subpopulations of cells, and that Stat3 retains a suppressive effect on mCLCA5 expression in 4T1 tumour cells. These findings enhance our understanding of the regulation of CLCA channel expression both in vitro and in vivo, and in particular, demonstrate that expression of mCLCA1 and mCLCA2 during involution is profoundly dependent upon Stat3, whereas the relationship between mCLCA5 and Stat3 activity is reciprocal and restricted to different subpopulations of cells.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Nature Publishing Group via http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/cddis.2016.30

Innovative radiation oncology Together – Precise, Personalized, Human : Vision 2030 for radiotherapy & radiation oncology in Germany

Purpose Scientific and clinical achievements in radiation, medical, and surgical oncology are changing the landscape of interdisciplinary oncology. The German Society for Radiation Oncology (DEGRO) working group of young clinicians and scientists (yDEGRO) and the DEGRO representation of associate and full professors (AKRO) are aware of the essential role of radiation oncology in multidisciplinary treatment approaches. Together, yDEGRO and AKRO endorsed developing a German radiotherapy & radiation oncology vision 2030 to address future challenges in patient care, research, and education. The vision 2030 aims to identify priorities and goals for the next decade in the field of radiation oncology. Methods The vision development comprised three phases. During the first phase, areas of interest, objectives, and the process of vision development were defined jointly by the yDEGRO, AKRO, and the DEGRO board. In the second phase, a one-day strategy retreat was held to develop AKRO and yDEGRO representatives’ final vision from medicine, biology, and physics. The third phase was dedicated to vision interpretation and program development by yDEGRO representatives. Results The strategy retreat’s development process resulted in conception of the final vision “Innovative radiation oncology Together – Precise, Personalized, Human.” The first term “Innovative radiation oncology” comprises the promotion of preclinical research and clinical trials and highlights the development of a national committee for strategic development in radiation oncology research. The term “together” underpins collaborations within radiation oncology departments as well as with other partners in the clinical and scientific setting. “Precise” mainly covers technological precision in radiotherapy as well as targeted oncologic therapeutics. “Personalized” emphasizes biology-directed individualization of radiation treatment. Finally, “Human” underlines the patient-centered approach and points towards the need for individual longer-term career curricula for clinicians and researchers in the field. Conclusion The vision 2030 balances the ambition of physical, technological, and biological innovation as well as a comprehensive, patient-centered, and collaborative approach towards radiotherapy & radiation oncology in Germany

Ubiquitination and degradation of SUMO1 by small-molecule degraders extends survival of mice with patient-derived tumors

Discovery of small-molecule degraders that activate ubiquitin ligase–mediated ubiquitination and degradation of targeted oncoproteins in cancer cells has been an elusive therapeutic strategy. Here, we report a cancer cell–based drug screen of the NCI drug-like compounds library that enabled identification of small-molecule degraders of the small ubiquitin-related modifier 1 (SUMO1). Structure-activity relationship studies of analogs of the hit compound CPD1 led to identification of a lead compound HB007 with improved properties and anticancer potency in vitro and in vivo. A genome-scale CRISPR-Cas9 knockout screen identified the substrate receptor F-box protein 42 (FBXO42) of cullin 1 (CUL1) E3 ubiquitin ligase as required for HB007 activity. Using HB007 pull-down proteomics assays, we pinpointed HB007’s binding protein as the cytoplasmic activation/proliferation-associated protein 1 (CAPRIN1). Biolayer interferometry and compound competitive immunoblot assays confirmed the selectivity of HB007’s binding to CAPRIN1. When bound to CAPRIN1, HB007 induced the interaction of CAPRIN1 with FBXO42. FBXO42 then recruited SUMO1 to the CAPRIN1-CUL1-FBXO42 ubiquitin ligase complex, where SUMO1 was ubiquitinated in several of human cancer cells. HB007 selectively degraded SUMO1 in patient tumor–derived xenografts implanted into mice. Systemic administration of HB007 inhibited the progression of patient-derived brain, breast, colon, and lung cancers in mice and increased survival of the animals. This cancer cell–based screening approach enabled discovery of a small-molecule degrader of SUMO1 and may be useful for identifying other small-molecule degraders of oncoproteins

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

MRI characteristics in treatment for cerebral melanoma metastasis using stereotactic radiosurgery and concomitant checkpoint inhibitors or targeted therapeutics

Introduction!#!Combination therapy for melanoma brain metastases (MM) using stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and immune checkpoint-inhibition (ICI) or targeted therapy (TT) is currently of high interest. In this collective, time evolution and incidence of imaging findings indicative of pseudoprogression is sparsely researched. We therefore investigated time-course of MRI characteristics in these patients.!##!Methods!#!Data were obtained retrospectively from 27 patients (12 female, 15 male; mean 61 years, total of 169 MMs). Single lesion volumes, total MM burden and edema volumes were analyzed at baseline and follow-up MRIs in 2 months intervals after SRS up to 24 months. The occurrence of intralesional hemorrhages was recorded.!##!Results!#!17 patients (80 MM) received ICI, 8 (62 MM) TT and 2 (27 MM) ICI + TT concomitantly to SRS. MM-localization was frontal (n = 89), temporal (n = 23), parietal (n = 20), occipital (n = 10), basal ganglia/thalamus/insula (n = 10) and cerebellar (n = 10). A volumetric progression of MM 2-4 months after SRS was observed in combined treatment with ICI (p = 0.028) and ICI + TT (p = 0.043), whereas MMs treated with TT showed an early volumetric regression (p = 0.004). Edema volumes moderately correlated with total MM volumes (r = 0.57; p < 0.0001). Volumetric behavior did not differ significantly over time regarding lesions' initial sizes or localizations. No significant differences between groups were observed regarding rates of post-SRS intralesional hemorrhages.!##!Conclusion!#!Reversible volumetric increases in terms of pseudoprogression are observed 2-4 months after SRS in patients with MM concomitantly treated with ICI and ICI + TT, rarely after TT. Edema volumes mirror total MM volumes. Medical treatment type does not significantly affect rates of intralesional hemorrhage

Stereotactic radiosurgery and radiotherapy for brainstem metastases: An international multicenter analysis.

Brainstem metastases (BSM) present a significant neuro-oncological challenge, resulting in profound neurological deficits and poor survival outcomes. Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and fractionated stereotactic radiotherapy (FSRT) offer promising therapeutic avenues for BSM despite their precarious location. This international multicenter study investigates the efficacy and safety of SRS and FSRT in 136 patients with 144 BSM treated at nine institutions from 2005 to 2022. The median radiographic and clinical follow-up periods were 6.8 and 9.4 months, respectively. Predominantly, patients with BSM were managed with SRS (69.4%). The median prescription dose and isodose line for SRS were 18 Gy and 65%, respectively, while for FSRT, the median prescription dose was 21 Gy with a median isodose line of 70%. The 12-, 24-, and 36-month local control (LC) rates were 82.9%, 71.4%, and 61.2%, respectively. Corresponding overall survival rates at these time points were 61.1%, 34.7%, and 19.3%. In the multivariable Cox regression analysis for LC, only the minimum biologically effective dose was significantly associated with LC, favoring higher doses for improved control (in Gy, hazard ratio [HR]: 0.86, p < .01). Regarding overall survival, good performance status (Karnofsky performance status, ≥90%; HR: 0.43, p < .01) and prior whole brain radiotherapy (HR: 2.52, p < .01) emerged as associated factors. In 14 BSM (9.7%), treatment-related adverse events were noted, with a total of five (3.4%) radiation necrosis. SRS and FSRT for BSM exhibit efficacy and safety, making them suitable treatment options for affected patients

Radiomics for prediction of radiation-induced lung injury and oncologic outcome after robotic stereotactic body radiotherapy of lung cancer: results from two independent institutions

Objectives To generate and validate state-of-the-art radiomics models for prediction of radiation-induced lung injury and oncologic outcome in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients treated with robotic stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT). Methods Radiomics models were generated from the planning CT images of 110 patients with primary, inoperable stage I/IIa NSCLC who were treated with robotic SBRT using a risk-adapted fractionation scheme at the University Hospital Cologne (training cohort). In total, 199 uncorrelated radiomic features fulfilling the standards of the Image Biomarker Standardization Initiative (IBSI) were extracted from the outlined gross tumor volume (GTV). Regularized models (Coxnet and Gradient Boost) for the development of local lung fibrosis (LF), local tumor control (LC), disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were built from either clinical/ dosimetric variables, radiomics features or a combination thereof and validated in a comparable cohort of 71 patients treated by robotic SBRT at the Radiosurgery Center in Northern Germany (test cohort). Results Oncologic outcome did not differ significantly between the two cohorts (OS at 36 months 56% vs. 43%, p = 0.065; median DFS 25 months vs. 23 months, p = 0.43; LC at 36 months 90% vs. 93%, p = 0.197). Local lung fibrosis developed in 33% vs. 35% of the patients (p = 0.75), all events were observed within 36 months. In the training cohort, radiomics models were able to predict OS, DFS and LC (concordance index 0.77-0.99, p < 0.005), but failed to generalize to the test cohort. In opposite, models for the development of lung fibrosis could be generated from both clinical/dosimetric factors and radiomic features or combinations thereof, which were both predictive in the training set (concordance index 0.71- 0.79, p < 0.005) and in the test set (concordance index 0.59-0.66, p < 0.05). The best performing model included 4 clinical/dosimetric variables (GTV-D-mean, PTV-D-95%, Lung-D-1ml, age) and 7 radiomic features (concordance index 0.66, p < 0.03). Conclusion Despite the obvious difficulties in generalizing predictive models for oncologic outcome and toxicity, this analysis shows that carefully designed radiomics models for prediction of local lung fibrosis after SBRT of early stage lung cancer perform well across different institutions

Quality requirements for MRI simulation in cranial stereotactic radiotherapy: a guideline from the German Taskforce “Imaging in Stereotactic Radiotherapy”

Abstract Accurate Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) simulation is fundamental for high-precision stereotactic radiosurgery and fractionated stereotactic radiotherapy, collectively referred to as stereotactic radiotherapy (SRT), to deliver doses of high biological effectiveness to well-defined cranial targets. Multiple MRI hardware related factors as well as scanner configuration and sequence protocol parameters can affect the imaging accuracy and need to be optimized for the special purpose of radiotherapy treatment planning. MRI simulation for SRT is possible for different organizational environments including patient referral for imaging as well as dedicated MRI simulation in the radiotherapy department but require radiotherapy-optimized MRI protocols and defined quality standards to ensure geometrically accurate images that form an impeccable foundation for treatment planning. For this guideline, an interdisciplinary panel including experts from the working group for radiosurgery and stereotactic radiotherapy of the German Society for Radiation Oncology (DEGRO), the working group for physics and technology in stereotactic radiotherapy of the German Society for Medical Physics (DGMP), the German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC), the German Society of Neuroradiology (DGNR) and the German Chapter of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine (DS-ISMRM) have defined minimum MRI quality requirements as well as advanced MRI simulation options for cranial SRT

Predictive and prognostic value of tumor volume and its changes during radical radiotherapy of stage III non-small cell lung cancer A systematic review

Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Stage III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) includes heterogeneous presentation of the disease including lymph node involvement and large tumour volumes with infiltration of the mediastinum, heart or spine. In the treatment of stage III NSCLC an interdisciplinary approach including radiotherapy is considered standard of care with acceptable toxicity and improved clinical outcome concerning local control. Furthermore, gross tumour volume (GTV) changes during definitive radiotherapy would allow for adaptive replanning which offers normal tissue sparing and dose escalation. A literature review was conducted to describe the predictive value of GTV changes during definitive radiotherapy especially focussing on overall survival. The literature search was conducted in a two-step review process using PubMedA (R)/MedlineA (R) with the key words stage III non-small cell lung cancer and radiotherapy and tumour volume and prognostic factors. After final consideration 17, 14 and 9 studies with a total of 2516, 784 and 639 patients on predictive impact of GTV, GTV changes and its impact on overall survival, respectively, for definitive radiotherapy for stage III NSCLC were included in this review. Initial GTV is an important prognostic factor for overall survival in several studies, but the time of evaluation and the value of histology need to be further investigated. GTV changes during RT differ widely, optimal timing for re-evaluation of GTV and their predictive value for prognosis needs to be clarified. The prognostic value of GTV changes is unclear due to varying study qualities, re-evaluation time and conflicting results. The main findings were that the clinical impact of GTV changes during definitive radiotherapy is still unclear due to heterogeneous study designs with varying quality. Several potential confounding variables were found and need to be considered for future studies to evaluate GTV changes during definitive radiotherapy with respect to treatment outcome