Изучение байесовского подхода к анализу медико-биологических данных в курсе медицинской и биологической физики

Background: The clinical behaviour of colon cancer is heterogeneous. Five-year overall survival is 50-65% with all stages included. Recurring somatic chromosomal alterations have been identified and some have shown potential as markers for dissemination of the tumour, which is responsible for most colon cancer deaths. We investigated 115 selected stage II-IV primary colon cancers for associations between chromosomal alterations and tumour dissemination. Methods: Follow-up was at least 5 years for stage II-III patients without distant recurrence. Affymetrix SNP 6.0 microarrays and allele-specific copy number analysis were used to identify chromosomal alterations. Fisher's exact test was used to associate alterations with tumour dissemination, detected at diagnosis (stage IV) or later as recurrent disease (stage II-III). Results: Loss of 1p36.11-21 was associated with tumour dissemination in microsatellite stable tumours of stage II-IV (odds ratio = 5.5). It was enriched to a similar extent in tumours with distant recurrence within stage II and stage III subgroups, and may therefore be used as a prognostic marker at diagnosis. Loss of 1p36.11-21 relative to average copy number of the genome showed similar prognostic value compared to absolute loss of copies. Therefore, the use of relative loss as a prognostic marker would benefit more patients by applying also to hyperploid cancer genomes. The association with tumour dissemination was supported by independent data from the The Cancer Genome Atlas. Conclusion: Deletions on 1p36 may be used to guide adjuvant treatment decisions in microsatellite stable colon cancer of stages II and III

A Phylometagenomic Exploration of Oceanic Alphaproteobacteria Reveals Mitochondrial Relatives Unrelated to the SAR11 Clade

BACKGROUND: According to the endosymbiont hypothesis, the mitochondrial system for aerobic respiration was derived from an ancestral Alphaproteobacterium. Phylogenetic studies indicate that the mitochondrial ancestor is most closely related to the Rickettsiales. Recently, it was suggested that Candidatus Pelagibacter ubique, a member of the SAR11 clade that is highly abundant in the oceans, is a sister taxon to the mitochondrial-Rickettsiales clade. The availability of ocean metagenome data substantially increases the sampling of Alphaproteobacteria inhabiting the oxygen-containing waters of the oceans that likely resemble the originating environment of mitochondria. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We present a phylogenetic study of the origin of mitochondria that incorporates metagenome data from the Global Ocean Sampling (GOS) expedition. We identify mitochondrially related sequences in the GOS dataset that represent a rare group of Alphaproteobacteria, designated OMAC (Oceanic Mitochondria Affiliated Clade) as the closest free-living relatives to mitochondria in the oceans. In addition, our analyses reject the hypothesis that the mitochondrial system for aerobic respiration is affiliated with that of the SAR11 clade. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Our results allude to the existence of an alphaproteobacterial clade in the oxygen-rich surface waters of the oceans that represents the closest free-living relative to mitochondria identified thus far. In addition, our findings underscore the importance of expanding the taxonomic diversity in phylogenetic analyses beyond that represented by cultivated bacteria to study the origin of mitochondria

Timing of chromosomal alterations during tumour development

During cancer development, tumour cells will accumulate a lot of both somatic point mutations and copy number alterations. It is not unusual that affected genes have a copy number that differs from the usual two. Due to the loss of DNA repair mechanisms the cells can mutate independent from each other which gives rise to different subclones within the tumour. A tumour cell and its future daughter cells that gets an advantage in cell division speed compared to its competing neighbours, will eventually make up a large portion of the tumour. All the mutations that the subclone’s most recent common ancestor acquired until the expansion will be shared across the subclone. In this project, we have developed a method using the mutation frequencies from publicly available whole genome sequencing data, to quantify the amount of competing subclones in a sample and determining the time to its copy number duplications. This method could be further developed to be an extension to regular copy number analysis. A heterogeneous tumour can grow faster and be more resistant to treatment. Therefore, it is important to learn more about cancer development and get a greater understanding of the order in which copy number alterations occur

Timing of chromosomal alterations during tumour development

During cancer development, tumour cells will accumulate a lot of both somatic point mutations and copy number alterations. It is not unusual that affected genes have a copy number that differs from the usual two. Due to the loss of DNA repair mechanisms the cells can mutate independent from each other which gives rise to different subclones within the tumour. A tumour cell and its future daughter cells that gets an advantage in cell division speed compared to its competing neighbours, will eventually make up a large portion of the tumour. All the mutations that the subclone’s most recent common ancestor acquired until the expansion will be shared across the subclone. In this project, we have developed a method using the mutation frequencies from publicly available whole genome sequencing data, to quantify the amount of competing subclones in a sample and determining the time to its copy number duplications. This method could be further developed to be an extension to regular copy number analysis. A heterogeneous tumour can grow faster and be more resistant to treatment. Therefore, it is important to learn more about cancer development and get a greater understanding of the order in which copy number alterations occur

Rawcopy : Improved copy number analysis with Affymetrix arrays

Microarray data is subject to noise and systematic variation that negatively affects the resolution of copy number analysis. We describe Rawcopy, an R package for processing of Affymetrix CytoScan HD, CytoScan 750k and SNP 6.0 microarray raw intensities (CEL files). Noise characteristics of a large number of reference samples are used to estimate log ratio and B-allele frequency for total and allele-specific copy number analysis. Rawcopy achieves better signal-to-noise ratio and higher proportion of validated alterations than commonly used free and proprietary alternatives. In addition, Rawcopy visualizes each microarray sample for assessment of technical quality, patient identity and genome-wide absolute copy number states. Software and instructions are available at http://rawcopy.org

Gains of Chromosome 1p and 15q are Associated with Poor Survival After Cytoreductive Surgery and HIPEC for Treating Colorectal Peritoneal Metastases

Purpose: Genetic alterations in colorectal peritoneal metastases (PM) are largely unknown. This study was designed to analyze whole-genome copy number alterations (CNA) in colorectal PM and to identify alterations associated with prognosis after cytoreductive surgery (CRS) and hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) Methods: All patients with PM, originating from a colorectal adenocarcinoma, who were treated with CRS and HIPEC in Uppsala Sweden, between 2004 and 2015, were included (n = 114). DNA derived from formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) specimens were analyzed for CNA using molecular inversion probe arrays. Results: There were extensive but varying degrees of CNA, ranging from minimal CNA to total aneuploidy. In particular, gain of parts of chromosome 1p and major parts of 15q were associated with poor survival. A combination of gains of 1p and 15q was associated with poor survival, also after adjustment for differences in peritoneal cancer index and completeness of cytoreduction score [hazard ratio (HR) 5.96; 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.19-16.18]. These patients had a mean copy number (CN) of 3.19 compared with 2.24 in patients without gains. Complete CN analysis was performed in 53 patients. Analysis was unsuccessful for the remaining patients due to insufficient amounts of DNA and signals caused by interstitial components and normal cells. There was no difference in survival between patients with successful and unsuccessful CN analysis. Conclusions: This study shows that gains of parts of chromosome 1p and of major parts of chromosome 15q were significantly associated with poor survival after CRS and HIPEC, which could represent future prognostic biomarkers

Different patterns of clonal evolution among different sarcoma subtypes followed for up to 25 years

To compare clonal evolution in tumors arising through different mechanisms, we selected three types of sarcoma-amplicon-driven well-differentiated liposarcoma (WDLS), gene fusion-driven myxoid liposarcoma (MLS), and sarcomas with complex genomes (CXS)-and assessed the dynamics of chromosome and nucleotide level mutations by cytogenetics, SNP array analysis and whole-exome sequencing. Here we show that the extensive single-cell variation in WDLS has minor impact on clonal key amplicons in chromosome 12. In addition, only a few of the single nucleotide variants in WDLS were present in more than one lesion, suggesting that such mutations are of little significance in tumor development. MLS displays few mutations other than the FUS-DDIT3 fusion, and the primary tumor is genetically sometimes much more complex than its relapses, whereas CXS in general shows a gradual increase of both nucleotide- and chromosome-level mutations, similar to what has been described in carcinomas

Scattered genomic amplification in dedifferentiated liposarcoma

Background: Atypical lipomatous tumor (ALT), well differentiated liposarcoma (WDLS) and dedifferentiated liposarcoma (DDLS) are cytogenetically characterized by near-diploid karyotypes with no or few other aberrations than supernumerary ring or giant marker chromosomes, although DDLS tend to have somewhat more complex rearrangements. In contrast, pleomorphic liposarcomas (PLS) have highly aberrant and heterogeneous karyotypes. The ring and giant marker chromosomes contain discontinuous amplicons, in particular including multiple copies of the target genes CDK4, HMGA2 and MDM2 from 12q, but often also sequences from other chromosomes. Results: The present study presents a DDLS with an atypical hypertriploid karyotype without any ring or giant marker chromosomes. SNP array analyses revealed amplification of almost the entire 5p and discontinuous amplicons of 12q including the classical target genes, in particular CDK4. In addition, amplicons from 1q, 3q, 7p, 9p, 11q and 20q, covering from 2 to 14 Mb, were present. FISH analyses showed that sequences from 5p and 12q were scattered, separately or together, over more than 10 chromosomes of varying size. At RNA sequencing, significantly elevated expression, compared to myxoid liposarcomas, was seen for TRIO and AMACR in 5p and of CDK4, HMGA2 and MDM2 in 12q. Conclusions: The observed pattern of scattered amplification does not show the characteristics of chromothripsis, but is novel and differs from the well known cytogenetic manifestations of amplification, i. e., double minutes, homogeneously staining regions and ring chromosomes. Possible explanations for this unusual distribution of amplified sequences might be the mechanism of alternative lengthening of telomeres that is frequently active in DDLS and events associated with telomere crisis