Pan-cancer Survey of Epithelial-mesenchymal Transition Markers Across the Cancer Genome Atlas

Overview

Journal Dev Dyn

Publisher Wiley

Specialty Anatomy & Histology

Date 2017 Jan 11

PMID 28073171

Citations 68

Authors

Don L Gibbons

Chad J Creighton

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Background: While epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) can be readily induced experimentally in cancer cells, the EMT process as manifested in human tumors needs to be better understood. Pan-cancer genomic datasets from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), representing over 10,000 patients and 32 distinct cancer types, provide a rich resource for examining correlative patterns involving EMT mediators in the setting of human cancers.

Results: Here, we surveyed a 16-gene signature of canonical EMT markers in TCGA pan-cancer cohort. The histology or cell-of-origin of a tumor sample may align more with mesenchymal or epithelial phenotype, and noncancer as well as cancer cells can contribute to the overall molecular patterns observed within a tumor sample; correlation models involving EMT markers can factor in both of the above variables. EMT-associated genes appear coordinately expressed across all cancers and within each cancer type surveyed. Gene signatures of immune cells correlate highly with EMT marker expression in tumors. In pan-cancer analysis, several EMT-related genes can be significantly associated with worse patient outcome.

Conclusions: Gene correlates of EMT phenotype in human tumors could include novel mediators of EMT that might be confirmed experimentally, by which TCGA datasets may serve as a platform for discovery in ongoing studies. Developmental Dynamics 247:555-564, 2018. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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