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Relation between smoking history and gene expression profiles in lung adenocarcinomas

Staaf, Johan LU orcid ; Jönsson, Göran B LU ; Jönsson, Mats LU ; Karlsson, Anna ; Isaksson, Sofi LU ; Salomonsson, Annette LU ; Pettersson, Helen LU ; Soller, Maria LU ; Ewers, Sven-Börje LU and Johansson, Leif LU , et al. (2012) In BMC Medical Genomics 5.
Abstract
Background: Lung cancer is the worldwide leading cause of death from cancer. Tobacco usage is the major pathogenic factor, but all lung cancers are not attributable to smoking. Specifically, lung cancer in never-smokers has been suggested to represent a distinct disease entity compared to lung cancer arising in smokers due to differences in etiology, natural history and response to specific treatment regimes. However, the genetic aberrations that differ between smokers and never-smokers' lung carcinomas remain to a large extent unclear. Methods: Unsupervised gene expression analysis of 39 primary lung adenocarcinomas was performed using Illumina HT-12 microarrays. Results from unsupervised analysis were validated in six external... (More)
Background: Lung cancer is the worldwide leading cause of death from cancer. Tobacco usage is the major pathogenic factor, but all lung cancers are not attributable to smoking. Specifically, lung cancer in never-smokers has been suggested to represent a distinct disease entity compared to lung cancer arising in smokers due to differences in etiology, natural history and response to specific treatment regimes. However, the genetic aberrations that differ between smokers and never-smokers' lung carcinomas remain to a large extent unclear. Methods: Unsupervised gene expression analysis of 39 primary lung adenocarcinomas was performed using Illumina HT-12 microarrays. Results from unsupervised analysis were validated in six external adenocarcinoma data sets (n=687), and six data sets comprising normal airway epithelial or normal lung tissue specimens (n=467). Supervised gene expression analysis between smokers and never-smokers were performed in seven adenocarcinoma data sets, and results validated in the six normal data sets. Results: Initial unsupervised analysis of 39 adenocarcinomas identified two subgroups of which one harbored all never-smokers. A generated gene expression signature could subsequently identify never-smokers with 79-100% sensitivity in external adenocarcinoma data sets and with 76-88% sensitivity in the normal materials. A notable fraction of current/former smokers were grouped with never-smokers. Intriguingly, supervised analysis of never-smokers versus smokers in seven adenocarcinoma data sets generated similar results. Overlap in classification between the two approaches was high, indicating that both approaches identify a common set of samples from current/former smokers as potential never-smokers. The gene signature from unsupervised analysis included several genes implicated in lung tumorigenesis, immune-response associated pathways, genes previously associated with smoking, as well as marker genes for alveolar type II pneumocytes, while the best classifier from supervised analysis comprised genes strongly associated with proliferation, but also genes previously associated with smoking. Conclusions: Based on gene expression profiling, we demonstrate that never-smokers can be identified with high sensitivity in both tumor material and normal airway epithelial specimens. Our results indicate that tumors arising in never-smokers, together with a subset of tumors from smokers, represent a distinct entity of lung adenocarcinomas. Taken together, these analyses provide further insight into the transcriptional patterns occurring in lung adenocarcinoma stratified by smoking history. (Less)
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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Lung cancer, Smoking, Gene expression analysis, Adenocarcinoma, EGFR, Never-smokers, Immune response
in
BMC Medical Genomics
volume
5
publisher
BioMed Central (BMC)
external identifiers
  • wos:000309180200001
  • scopus:84861889680
  • pmid:22676229
ISSN
1755-8794
DOI
10.1186/1755-8794-5-22
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
The information about affiliations in this record was updated in December 2015. The record was previously connected to the following departments: Thoracic Surgery (013230027), Pathology, (Lund) (013030000), Molecular Medicine (013031200), Division of Clinical Genetics (013022003), Oncology, MV (013035000)
id
295295e9-d736-4144-bb22-55b7cf8c055f (old id 3191579)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 14:24:54
date last changed
2023-04-18 20:15:16
@article{295295e9-d736-4144-bb22-55b7cf8c055f,
  abstract     = {{Background: Lung cancer is the worldwide leading cause of death from cancer. Tobacco usage is the major pathogenic factor, but all lung cancers are not attributable to smoking. Specifically, lung cancer in never-smokers has been suggested to represent a distinct disease entity compared to lung cancer arising in smokers due to differences in etiology, natural history and response to specific treatment regimes. However, the genetic aberrations that differ between smokers and never-smokers' lung carcinomas remain to a large extent unclear. Methods: Unsupervised gene expression analysis of 39 primary lung adenocarcinomas was performed using Illumina HT-12 microarrays. Results from unsupervised analysis were validated in six external adenocarcinoma data sets (n=687), and six data sets comprising normal airway epithelial or normal lung tissue specimens (n=467). Supervised gene expression analysis between smokers and never-smokers were performed in seven adenocarcinoma data sets, and results validated in the six normal data sets. Results: Initial unsupervised analysis of 39 adenocarcinomas identified two subgroups of which one harbored all never-smokers. A generated gene expression signature could subsequently identify never-smokers with 79-100% sensitivity in external adenocarcinoma data sets and with 76-88% sensitivity in the normal materials. A notable fraction of current/former smokers were grouped with never-smokers. Intriguingly, supervised analysis of never-smokers versus smokers in seven adenocarcinoma data sets generated similar results. Overlap in classification between the two approaches was high, indicating that both approaches identify a common set of samples from current/former smokers as potential never-smokers. The gene signature from unsupervised analysis included several genes implicated in lung tumorigenesis, immune-response associated pathways, genes previously associated with smoking, as well as marker genes for alveolar type II pneumocytes, while the best classifier from supervised analysis comprised genes strongly associated with proliferation, but also genes previously associated with smoking. Conclusions: Based on gene expression profiling, we demonstrate that never-smokers can be identified with high sensitivity in both tumor material and normal airway epithelial specimens. Our results indicate that tumors arising in never-smokers, together with a subset of tumors from smokers, represent a distinct entity of lung adenocarcinomas. Taken together, these analyses provide further insight into the transcriptional patterns occurring in lung adenocarcinoma stratified by smoking history.}},
  author       = {{Staaf, Johan and Jönsson, Göran B and Jönsson, Mats and Karlsson, Anna and Isaksson, Sofi and Salomonsson, Annette and Pettersson, Helen and Soller, Maria and Ewers, Sven-Börje and Johansson, Leif and Jönsson, Per and Planck, Maria}},
  issn         = {{1755-8794}},
  keywords     = {{Lung cancer; Smoking; Gene expression analysis; Adenocarcinoma; EGFR; Never-smokers; Immune response}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  publisher    = {{BioMed Central (BMC)}},
  series       = {{BMC Medical Genomics}},
  title        = {{Relation between smoking history and gene expression profiles in lung adenocarcinomas}},
  url          = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/3963659/3737908.pdf}},
  doi          = {{10.1186/1755-8794-5-22}},
  volume       = {{5}},
  year         = {{2012}},
}