Zhe Piao

Analysis of Apoptosis Protein Expression in Early-Stage Colorectal Cancer Suggests Opportunities for New Prognostic Biomarkers

Purpose: Although most stage II colon cancers are potentially curable by surgery alone, ∼20% of patients relapse, suggesting a need for establishing prognostic markers that can identify patients who may benefit from adjuvant chemotherapy. We tested the hypothesis that differences in expression of apoptosis-regulating proteins account for differences in clinical outcome among patients with early-stage colorectal cancer. Experimental Design: Tissue microarray technology was employed to assay the expression of apoptosis-regulating proteins by immunohistochemistry in 106 archival stage II colorectal cancers, making correlations with disease-specific survival. The influence of microsatellite instability (MSI), tumor location (left versus right side), patient age, and gender was also examined. Results: Elevated expression of several apoptosis regulators significantly correlated with either shorter (cIAP2; TUCAN) or longer (Apaf1; Bcl-2) overall survival in univariate and multivariate analyses. These biomarkers retained prognostic significance when adjusting for MSI, tumor location, patient age, and gender. Moreover, certain combinations of apoptosis biomarkers were highly predictive of death risk from cancer. For example, 97% of patients with favorable tumor phenotype of cIAP2low plus TUCANlow were alive at 5 years compared with 60% of other patients (P = 0.00003). In contrast, only 37% of patients with adverse biomarkers (Apaf1low plus TUCANhigh) survived compared with 83% of others at 5 years after diagnosis (P< 0.0001). Conclusions: Immunohistochemical assays directed at detection of certain combinations of apoptosis proteins may provide prognostic information for patients with early-stage colorectal cancer, and therefore could help to identify patients who might benefit from adjuvant chemotherapy or who should be spared it.

Mapping of a minimal deleted region in human hepatocellular carcinoma to 1p36.13–p36.23 and mutational analysis of the RIZ (PRDM2) gene localized to the region

Human chromosome band 1p36 commonly undergoes loss of heterozygosity (LOH) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) but the minimal deleted region remains to be mapped. This chromosomal region contains a candidate HCC suppressor gene, RIZ (PRDM2), that is a member of the PR (PRDI‐BF1‐RIZ homology)‐domain‐containing zinc finger gene family. One characteristic of this family is the unusual yin‐yang involvement in human cancers. The PR‐domain‐containing RIZ1 product of the RIZ locus, in contrast to the PR‐domain‐minus product RIZ2, is commonly lost or underexpressed in HCC. Furthermore, RIZ1 can induce cell cycle arrest, apoptosis, or both and suppress HCC tumorigenicity in nude mice. To help identify the putative HCC locus on 1p36 and to evaluate a genetic role of RIZ in HCC, we studied 97 HCC cases and mapped a minimal deleted region in HCC to 1p36.13–p36.23 between markers D1S434 and D1S436. Notably, RIZ mapped within this region and was found to undergo LOH in 37% (25/67) of HCC cases. Single‐strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP) analysis, however, did not show mutations in the PR‐domain region of RIZ1 in 49 cases of HCC examined. Our data suggest that the RIZ locus is a target of frequent deletion in HCC, but that the more common way of RIZ inactivation in HCC may not involve mutations that alter peptide sequences. Genes Chromosomes Cancer 28:269–275, 2000.

Identification of novel deletion regions on chromosome arms 2q and 6p in breast carcinomas by amplotype analysis

DNA fingerprinting by arbitrarily primed PCR (AP‐PCR) was employed to identify molecular genetic alterations in 37 primary breast carcinomas. AP‐PCR is a PCR‐based technique that uses only one primer of arbitrary sequence that generates a molecular karyotype (amplotype) of tumors. The breast cancer amplotype generated with two arbitrary primers (MCG1 and Blue) showed a relatively high frequency (more than 20% of the tumors) of gains at chromosomes 1, 4, and 8, and of losses at chromosomes 2, 4, 6, 9, 10, 11, 13, and the X chromosome. We further analyzed the regions most commonly gained at chromosome 8 (47%) and lost at chromosomes 2 (38%) and 6 (49%) by determining the subchromosomal localization of the fingerprint bands from these chromosomes. The region of gain at chromosome 8 was mapped at 8q24.1, close to MYC. Band MCG1‐A1 was assigned to chromosome band 2q22, and band Blue‐J was assigned to 6p21. Common losses of these chromosomal regions have not been described for breast cancer. To map these deletion regions more precisely, we performed loss of heterozygosity (LOH) analysis by microallelotyping on 20 of the 37 cancers previously analyzed by AP‐PCR and another additional 52 breast carcinomas. The results suggest that the regions at 2q21–24 and 6p21–23 may harbor novel tumor suppressor genes for breast cancer. LOH at 2q21–24 (D2S2304) was more frequent in high‐grade tumors (59%) than in low‐grade tumors (29%) (P = 0.03). This suggests that this genetic alteration may be associated with tumor progression and shows the power of the amplotype approach in detecting novel genetic alterations that are useful as clinical parameters of breast cancer.

Hypersensitivity of tumor cell lines with microsatellite instability to DNA double strand break producing chemotherapeutic agent bleomycin

Genetic or epigenetic inactivation of DNA mismatch repair genes results in a strong mutator phenotype, known as the microsatellite mutator phenotype or microsatellite instability (MSI). This mutator phenotype causes mutations in genes responsible for the regulation of cell growth and survival/death and thus promotes the development and progression of tumors. In addition to such tumorigenic lesions, mutations in genes of other types of DNA repair, for example, DNA double-strand break (DNA DSB) repair, are found in tumor cells with MSI. We report here that the majority of MSI-positive tumor cell lines of different tissue origins (endometrial, ovarian, prostate, and colorectal carcinomas) are hypersensitive to bleomycin, a DNA DSB producing chemotherapeutic drug. We suggest that this hypersensitivity may be a result of inactivation of the DNA DSB repair activity by concomitant mutations of different DNA DSB repair genes. To provide experimental support to this hypothesis, we show that the subclones of the MSI-positive colorectal cancer cell line HCT-8 that bear heterozygous frameshift mutations in the DNA DSB repair gene DNA-PKCS are more sensitive to a combined treatment with bleomycin and the DNA protein kinase inhibitor LY294002 than the original HCT-8 cells, which are wild type for this gene. These results may be useful in designing therapies for MSI-positive cancer.

Preferential loss of a polymorphic RIZ allele in human hepatocellular carcinoma.

The RIZ (PRDM2) locus commonly undergoes loss of heterozygosity (LOH) and maps within the minimal deleted region on 1p36 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Although peptide-altering mutations of RIZ are rare in HCC, the RIZ1 product is commonly lost in HCC and has tumour suppressive activities. Here, we analysed RIZ gene mutations and LOH in HCC, breast cancer, familial melanoma, colon cancer, and stomach cancer. We found 7 polymorphisms but no mutations. By analysing the Pro704-deletion polymorphism, we detected LOH of RIZ in 31 of 79 (39%) informative HCC cases, 11 of 47 (23%) colon cancer cases, 8 of 43 (19%) breast cancer cases, 8 of 66 (12%) stomach cancer cases. Importantly, loss of the Pro704+allele was found in 74% of the 31 LOH positive HCC cases (P< 0.01), indicating a preferential loss and hence a stronger tumour suppressor role for this allele compared to the P704−allele. In addition, the Pro704+allele was found to be more common in Asians (0.61) than Caucasians (0.42) (P = 0.0000), suggesting an interesting link between gene polymorphisms and potential differences in tumour incidence between racial groups.

Deletion mapping of chromosome 16q in hepatocellular carcinoma

SummaryHepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) frequently shows an allelic imbalance (AI) on chromosome 16q. In order to define the commonly affected regions on chromosome 16q, we assessed AI studies in 41 HCCs using a panel of 37 microsatellite markers. Thirty-five cases (85%) showed AI at one or more loci. Among the 35 cases with AI, 21 cases showed multiple AI, suggesting the wide scope of deletion on the long arm of chromosome 16, and the remaining 14 cases showed partial AI. Detailed deletion mapping identified two independent commonly deleted regions on this chromosome arm. These included the D16S3106 locus and D16S498 locus. In conclusion, we have demonstrated frequent AI on 16q in HCCs and identified two loci with frequent AI, which may harbour new tumour suppressor genes.

Frequent loss Xq25 on the inactive X chromosome in primary breast carcinomas is associated with tumor grade and axillary lymph node metastasis

We previously applied arbitrarily primed polymerase chain reaction DNA fingerprinting to identify molecular genetic alterations in primary breast carcinomas. One of the most frequently observed fingerprint alterations was a reduction in the intensity of the MCG1‐B2 band in 32% of tumors, indicating recurrent loss of X‐chromosome segments. This article reports a mapping analysis of those chromosomal deletions. The subchromosomal origin of MCG1‐B2 was determined to be the Xq25 chromosomal region. Loss of heterozygosity (LOH) analysis was carried out on 72 infiltrating ductal carcinomas with a panel of seven microsatellite markers spanning Xq25. The smallest common region of the X‐chromosome deletions was mapped to between markers DXS8059 and DXS8009, with the highest LOH frequency of 52.4% at the DXS8098 locus. The LOH at DXS8098 was associated with larger tumor size (> 3 cm) (P = 0.048, Fisher exact test), higher histologic grade (P = 0.036, Fisher exact test), and axillary lymph node metastasis (P = 0.020, Fisher exact test). These results suggest that the Xq25 region harbors a putative tumor suppressor gene whose inactivation in breast cancer is associated with tumor progression and metastasis. LOH at this region, therefore, potentially could be used as a prognostic marker for disease development. One of the two X chromosomes is transcriptionally silent in women. The loss of the Xq25 region detected in this study occurred preferentially on the inactive X chromosome. This suggests that the putative tumor suppressor gene may escape X inactivation.