Browsing by Author "Amos, Christopher I"
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Item Open Access A Novel Genetic Variant in Long Non-coding RNA Gene NEXN-AS1 is Associated with Risk of Lung Cancer.(Scientific reports, 2016-10-07) Yuan, Hua; Liu, Hongliang; Liu, Zhensheng; Owzar, Kouros; Han, Younghun; Su, Li; Wei, Yongyue; Hung, Rayjean J; McLaughlin, John; Brhane, Yonathan; Brennan, Paul; Bickeboeller, Heike; Rosenberger, Albert; Houlston, Richard S; Caporaso, Neil; Landi, Maria Teresa; Heinrich, Joachim; Risch, Angela; Christiani, David C; Gümüş, Zeynep H; Klein, Robert J; Amos, Christopher I; Wei, QingyiLung cancer etiology is multifactorial, and growing evidence has indicated that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are important players in lung carcinogenesis. We performed a large-scale meta-analysis of 690,564 SNPs in 15,531 autosomal lncRNAs by using datasets from six previously published genome-wide association studies (GWASs) from the Transdisciplinary Research in Cancer of the Lung (TRICL) consortium in populations of European ancestry. Previously unreported significant SNPs (P value < 1 × 10-7) were further validated in two additional independent lung cancer GWAS datasets from Harvard University and deCODE. In the final meta-analysis of all eight GWAS datasets with 17,153 cases and 239,337 controls, a novel risk SNP rs114020893 in the lncRNA NEXN-AS1 region at 1p31.1 remained statistically significant (odds ratio = 1.17; 95% confidence interval = 1.11-1.24; P = 8.31 × 10-9). In further in silico analysis, rs114020893 was predicted to change the secondary structure of the lncRNA. Our finding indicates that SNP rs114020893 of NEXN-AS1 at 1p31.1 may contribute to lung cancer susceptibility.Item Open Access Association of Common Genetic Polymorphisms with Melanoma Patient IL-12p40 Blood Levels, Risk, and Outcomes.(J Invest Dermatol, 2015-09) Fang, Shenying; Wang, Yuling; Chun, Yun S; Liu, Huey; Ross, Merrick I; Gershenwald, Jeffrey E; Cormier, Janice N; Royal, Richard E; Lucci, Anthony; Schacherer, Christopher W; Reveille, John D; Chen, Wei; Sui, Dawen; Bassett, Roland L; Wang, Li-E; Wei, Qingyi; Amos, Christopher I; Lee, Jeffrey ERecent investigation has identified association of IL-12p40 blood levels with melanoma recurrence and patient survival. No studies have investigated associations of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with melanoma patient IL-12p40 blood levels or their potential contributions to melanoma susceptibility or patient outcome. In the current study, 818,237 SNPs were available for 1,804 melanoma cases and 1,026 controls. IL-12p40 blood levels were assessed among 573 cases (discovery), 249 cases (case validation), and 299 controls (control validation). SNPs were evaluated for association with log[IL-12p40] levels in the discovery data set and replicated in two validation data sets, and significant SNPs were assessed for association with melanoma susceptibility and patient outcomes. The most significant SNP associated with log[IL-12p40] was in the IL-12B gene region (rs6897260, combined P=9.26 × 10(-38)); this single variant explained 13.1% of variability in log[IL-12p40]. The most significant SNP in EBF1 was rs6895454 (combined P=2.24 × 10(-9)). A marker in IL12B was associated with melanoma susceptibility (rs3213119, multivariate P=0.0499; OR=1.50, 95% CI 1.00-2.24), whereas a marker in EBF1 was associated with melanoma-specific survival in advanced-stage patients (rs10515789, multivariate P=0.02; HR=1.93, 95% CI 1.11-3.35). Both EBF1 and IL12B strongly regulate IL-12p40 blood levels, and IL-12p40 polymorphisms may contribute to melanoma susceptibility and influence patient outcome.Item Open Access Association of genetic variants of TMEM135 and PEX5 in the peroxisome pathway with cutaneous melanoma-specific survival.(Annals of translational medicine, 2021-03) Wang, Haijiao; Liu, Hongliang; Dai, Wei; Luo, Sheng; Amos, Christopher I; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Yue, Ying; Nan, Hongmei; Wei, QingyiBackground
Peroxisomes are ubiquitous and dynamic organelles that are involved in the metabolism of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and lipids. However, whether genetic variants in the peroxisome pathway genes are associated with survival in patients with melanoma has not been established. Therefore, our aim was to identify additional genetic variants in the peroxisome pathway that may provide new prognostic biomarkers for cutaneous melanoma (CM).Methods
We assessed the associations between 8,397 common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 88 peroxisome pathway genes and CM disease-specific survival (CMSS) in a two-stage analysis. For the discovery, we extracted the data from a published genome-wide association study from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC). We then replicated the results in another dataset from the Nurse Health Study (NHS)/Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS).Results
Overall, 95 (11.1%) patients in the MDACC dataset and 48 (11.7%) patients in the NHS/HPFS dataset died of CM. We found 27 significant SNPs in the peroxisome pathway genes to be associated with CMSS in both datasets after multiple comparison correction using the Bayesian false-discovery probability method. In stepwise Cox proportional hazards regression analysis, with adjustment for other covariates and previously published SNPs in the MDACC dataset, we identified 2 independent SNPs (TMEM135 rs567403 C>G and PEX5 rs7969508 A>G) that predicted CMSS (P=0.003 and 0.031, respectively, in an additive genetic model). The expression quantitative trait loci analysis further revealed that the TMEM135 rs567403 GG and PEX5 rs7969508 GG genotypes were associated with increased and decreased levels of mRNA expression of their genes, respectively.Conclusions
Once our findings are replicated by other investigators, these genetic variants may serve as novel biomarkers for the prediction of survival in patients with CM.Item Open Access Associations between genetic variants in mRNA splicing-related genes and risk of lung cancer: a pathway-based analysis from published GWASs.(Scientific reports, 2017-03-17) Pan, Yongchu; Liu, Hongliang; Wang, Yanru; Kang, Xiaozheng; Liu, Zhensheng; Owzar, Kouros; Han, Younghun; Su, Li; Wei, Yongyue; Hung, Rayjean J; Brhane, Yonathan; McLaughlin, John; Brennan, Paul; Bickeböller, Heike; Rosenberger, Albert; Houlston, Richard S; Caporaso, Neil; Teresa Landi, Maria; Heinrich, Joachim; Risch, Angela; Wu, Xifeng; Ye, Yuanqing; Christiani, David C; Amos, Christopher I; Wei, QingyimRNA splicing is an important mechanism to regulate mRNA expression. Abnormal regulation of this process may lead to lung cancer. Here, we investigated the associations of 11,966 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 206 mRNA splicing-related genes with lung cancer risk by using the summary data from six published genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of Transdisciplinary Research in Cancer of the Lung (TRICL) (12,160 cases and 16,838 controls) and another two lung cancer GWASs of Harvard University (984 cases and 970 controls) and deCODE (1,319 cases and 26,380 controls). We found that a total of 12 significant SNPs with false discovery rate (FDR) ≤0.05 were mapped to one novel gene PRPF6 and two previously reported genes (DHX16 and LSM2) that were also confirmed in this study. The six novel SNPs in PRPF6 were in high linkage disequilibrium and associated with PRPF6 mRNA expression in lymphoblastoid cells from 373 Europeans in the 1000 Genomes Project. Taken together, our studies shed new light on the role of mRNA splicing genes in the development of lung cancer.Item Open Access Component-wise gradient boosting and false discovery control in survival analysis with high-dimensional covariates.(Bioinformatics, 2016-01-01) He, Kevin; Li, Yanming; Zhu, Ji; Liu, Hongliang; Lee, Jeffrey E; Amos, Christopher I; Hyslop, Terry; Jin, Jiashun; Lin, Huazhen; Wei, Qinyi; Li, YiMOTIVATION: Technological advances that allow routine identification of high-dimensional risk factors have led to high demand for statistical techniques that enable full utilization of these rich sources of information for genetics studies. Variable selection for censored outcome data as well as control of false discoveries (i.e. inclusion of irrelevant variables) in the presence of high-dimensional predictors present serious challenges. This article develops a computationally feasible method based on boosting and stability selection. Specifically, we modified the component-wise gradient boosting to improve the computational feasibility and introduced random permutation in stability selection for controlling false discoveries. RESULTS: We have proposed a high-dimensional variable selection method by incorporating stability selection to control false discovery. Comparisons between the proposed method and the commonly used univariate and Lasso approaches for variable selection reveal that the proposed method yields fewer false discoveries. The proposed method is applied to study the associations of 2339 common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with overall survival among cutaneous melanoma (CM) patients. The results have confirmed that BRCA2 pathway SNPs are likely to be associated with overall survival, as reported by previous literature. Moreover, we have identified several new Fanconi anemia (FA) pathway SNPs that are likely to modulate survival of CM patients. AVAILABILITY AND IMPLEMENTATION: The related source code and documents are freely available at https://sites.google.com/site/bestumich/issues. CONTACT: yili@umich.edu.Item Open Access Functional Variants in Notch Pathway Genes NCOR2, NCSTN, and MAML2 Predict Survival of Patients with Cutaneous Melanoma.(Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev, 2015-07) Zhang, Weikang; Liu, Hongliang; Liu, Zhensheng; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Wei, QingyiBACKGROUND: The Notch signaling pathway is constitutively activated in human cutaneous melanoma to promote growth and aggressive metastatic potential of primary melanoma cells. Therefore, genetic variants in Notch pathway genes may affect the prognosis of cutaneous melanoma patients. METHODS: We identified 6,256 SNPs in 48 Notch genes in 858 cutaneous melanoma patients included in a previously published cutaneous melanoma genome-wide association study dataset. Multivariate and stepwise Cox proportional hazards regression and false-positive report probability corrections were performed to evaluate associations between putative functional SNPs and cutaneous melanoma disease-specific survival. Receiver operating characteristic curve was constructed, and area under the curve was used to assess the classification performance of the model. RESULTS: Four putative functional SNPs of Notch pathway genes had independent and joint predictive roles in survival of cutaneous melanoma patients. The most significant variant was NCOR2 rs2342924 T>C (adjusted HR, 2.71; 95% confidence interval, 1.73-4.23; Ptrend = 9.62 × 10(-7)), followed by NCSTN rs1124379 G>A, NCOR2 rs10846684 G>A, and MAML2 rs7953425 G>A (Ptrend = 0.005, 0.005, and 0.013, respectively). The receiver operating characteristic analysis revealed that area under the curve was significantly increased after adding the combined unfavorable genotype score to the model containing the known clinicopathologic factors. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that SNPs in Notch pathway genes may be predictors of cutaneous melanoma disease-specific survival. IMPACT: Our discovery offers a translational potential for using genetic variants in Notch pathway genes as a genotype score of biomarkers for developing an improved prognostic assessment and personalized management of cutaneous melanoma patients.Item Open Access Gene by Environment Investigation of Incident Lung Cancer Risk in African-Americans.(EBioMedicine, 2016-02) David, Sean P; Wang, Ange; Kapphahn, Kristopher; Hedlin, Haley; Desai, Manisha; Henderson, Michael; Yang, Lingyao; Walsh, Kyle M; Schwartz, Ann G; Wiencke, John K; Spitz, Margaret R; Wenzlaff, Angela S; Wrensch, Margaret R; Eaton, Charles B; Furberg, Helena; Mark Brown, W; Goldstein, Benjamin A; Assimes, Themistocles; Tang, Hua; Kooperberg, Charles L; Quesenberry, Charles P; Tindle, Hilary; Patel, Manali I; Amos, Christopher I; Bergen, Andrew W; Swan, Gary E; Stefanick, Marcia LBACKGROUND: Genome-wide association studies have identified polymorphisms linked to both smoking exposure and risk of lung cancer. The degree to which lung cancer risk is driven by increased smoking, genetics, or gene-environment interactions is not well understood. METHODS: We analyzed associations between 28 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) previously associated with smoking quantity and lung cancer in 7156 African-American females in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI), then analyzed main effects of top nominally significant SNPs and interactions between SNPs, cigarettes per day (CPD) and pack-years for lung cancer in an independent, multi-center case-control study of African-American females and males (1078 lung cancer cases and 822 controls). FINDINGS: Nine nominally significant SNPs for CPD in WHI were associated with incident lung cancer (corrected p-values from 0.027 to 6.09 × 10(-5)). CPD was found to be a nominally significant effect modifier between SNP and lung cancer for six SNPs, including CHRNA5 rs2036527[A](betaSNP*CPD = - 0.017, p = 0.0061, corrected p = 0.054), which was associated with CPD in a previous genome-wide meta-analysis of African-Americans. INTERPRETATION: These results suggest that chromosome 15q25.1 variants are robustly associated with CPD and lung cancer in African-Americans and that the allelic dose effect of these polymorphisms on lung cancer risk is most pronounced in lighter smokers.Item Open Access Genetic variants in ELOVL2 and HSD17B12 predict melanoma-specific survival.(International journal of cancer, 2019-02-08) Dai, Wei; Liu, Hongliang; Xu, Xinyuan; Ge, Jie; Luo, Sheng; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Nan, Hongmei; Li, Chunying; Wei, QingyiFatty acids play a key role in cellular bioenergetics, membrane biosynthesis and intracellular signaling processes and thus may be involved in cancer development and progression. In the present study, we comprehensively assessed associations of 14,522 common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 149 genes of the fatty-acid synthesis pathway with cutaneous melanoma disease-specific survival (CMSS). The dataset of 858 cutaneous melanoma (CM) patients from a published genome-wide association study (GWAS) by The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center was used as the discovery dataset, and the identified significant SNPs were validated by a dataset of 409 CM patients from another GWAS from the Nurses' Health and Health Professionals Follow-up Studies. We found 40 noteworthy SNPs to be associated with CMSS in both discovery and validation datasets after multiple comparison correction by the false positive report probability method, because more than 85% of the SNPs were imputed. By performing functional prediction, linkage disequilibrium analysis, and stepwise Cox regression selection, we identified two independent SNPs of ELOVL2 rs3734398 T>C and HSD17B12 rs11037684 A>G that predicted CMSS, with an allelic hazards ratio of 0.66 (95% confidence interval = 0.51-0.84 and p = 8.34 × 10-4 ) and 2.29 (1.55-3.39 and p = 3.61 × 10-5 ), respectively. Finally, the ELOVL2 rs3734398 variant CC genotype was found to be associated with a significantly increased mRNA expression level. These SNPs may be potential markers for CM prognosis, if validated by additional larger and mechanistic studies.Item Unknown Genetic variants in fanconi anemia pathway genes BRCA2 and FANCA predict melanoma survival.(The Journal of investigative dermatology, 2015-02) Yin, Jieyun; Liu, Hongliang; Liu, Zhensheng; Wang, Li-E; Chen, Wei V; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Wei, QingyiCutaneous melanoma (CM) is the most lethal skin cancer. The Fanconi anemia (FA) pathway involved in DNA crosslink repair may affect CM susceptibility and prognosis. Using data derived from published genome-wide association study, we comprehensively analyzed the associations of 2,339 common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 14 autosomal FA genes with overall survival (OS) in 858 CM patients. By performing false-positive report probability corrections and stepwise Cox proportional hazards regression analyses, we identified significant associations between CM OS and four putatively functional SNPs: BRCA2 rs10492396 (AG vs. GG: adjusted hazard ratio (adjHR)=1.85, 95% confidence interval (CI)=1.16-2.95, P=0.010), rs206118 (CC vs. TT+TC: adjHR=2.44, 95% CI=1.27-4.67, P=0.007), rs3752447 (CC vs. TT+TC: adjHR=2.10, 95% CI=1.38-3.18, P=0.0005), and FANCA rs62068372 (TT vs. CC+CT: adjHR=1.85, 95% CI=1.27-2.69, P=0.001). Moreover, patients with an increasing number of unfavorable genotypes (NUG) of these loci had markedly reduced OS and melanoma-specific survival (MSS). The final model incorporating with NUG, tumor stage, and Breslow thickness showed an improved discriminatory ability to classify both 5-year OS and 5-year MSS. Additional investigations, preferably prospective studies, are needed to validate our findings.Item Unknown Genetic variants in PDSS1 and SLC16A6 of the ketone body metabolic pathway predict cutaneous melanoma-specific survival.(Molecular carcinogenesis, 2020-06) Dai, Wei; Liu, Hongliang; Chen, Ka; Xu, Xinyuan; Qian, Danwen; Luo, Sheng; Amos, Christopher I; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Nan, Hongmei; Li, Chunying; Wei, QingyiA few single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have been identified to be associated with cutaneous melanoma (CM) survival through genome-wide association studies, but stringent multiple testing corrections required for the hypothesis-free testing may have masked some true associations. Using a hypothesis-driven analysis approach, we sought to evaluate associations between SNPs in ketone body metabolic pathway genes and CM survival. We comprehensively assessed associations between 4196 (538 genotyped and 3658 imputed) common SNPs in 44 ketone body metabolic pathway genes and CM survival, using a dataset of 858 patients of a case-control study from The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center as the discovery set and another dataset of 409 patients from the Nurses' Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study as the replication set. There were 95/858 (11.1%) and 48/409 (11.7%) patients who died of CM, respectively. We identified two independent SNPs (ie, PDSS1 rs12254548 G>C and SLC16A6 rs71387392 G>A) that were associated with CM survival, with allelic hazards ratios of 0.58 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.44-0.76, P = 9.00 × 10-5 ) and 1.98 (95% CI = 1.34-2.94, P = 6.30 × 10-4 ), respectively. Additionally, associations between genotypes of the SNPs and messenger RNA expression levels of their corresponding genes support the biologic plausibility of a role for these two variants in CM tumor progression and survival. Once validated by other larger studies, PDSS1 rs12254548 and SLC16A6 rs71387392 may be valuable biomarkers for CM survival.Item Open Access Genetic variants in RORA and DNMT1 associated with cutaneous melanoma survival.(International journal of cancer, 2018-06) Li, Bo; Wang, Yanru; Xu, Yinghui; Liu, Hongliang; Bloomer, Wendy; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Han, Jiali; Wei, QingyiCutaneous melanoma (CM) is considered as a steroid hormone-related malignancy. However, few studies have evaluated the roles of genetic variants encoding steroid hormone receptor genes and their related regulators (SHR-related genes) in CM-specific survival (CMSS). Here, we performed a pathway-based analysis to evaluate genetic variants of 191 SHR-related genes in 858 CMSS patients using a dataset from a genome-wide association study (GWAS) from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC), and then validated the results in an additional dataset of 409 patients from the Harvard GWAS. Using multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis, we identified three-independent SNPs (RORA rs782917 G > A, RORA rs17204952 C > T and DNMT1 rs7253062 G > A) as predictors of CMSS, with a variant-allele attributed hazards ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval of 1.62 (1.25-2.09), 1.60 (1.20-2.13) and 1.52 (1.20-1.94), respectively. Combined analysis of risk genotypes of these three SNPs revealed a decreased CMSS in a dose-response manner as the number of risk genotypes increased (ptrend < 0.001); however, no improvement in the prediction model was observed (area under the curve [AUC] = 79.6-80.8%, p = 0.656), when these risk genotypes were added to the model containing clinical variables. Our findings suggest that genetic variants of RORA and DNMT1 may be promising biomarkers for CMSS, but these results needed to be validated in future larger studies.Item Open Access Genetic variants in the calcium signaling pathway genes are associated with cutaneous melanoma-specific survival.(Carcinogenesis, 2018-12-29) Wang, Xiaomeng; Liu, Hongliang; Xu, Yinghui; Xie, Jichun; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Nan, Hongmei; Song, Yanqiu; Wei, QingyiRemodeling or deregulation of the calcium signaling pathway is a relevant hallmark of cancer including cutaneous melanoma (CM). In the present study, using data from a published genome-wide association study (GWAS) from The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, we assessed the role of 41,377 common single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of 167 calcium signaling pathway genes in CM survival. We used another GWAS from Harvard University as the validation dataset. In the single-locus analysis, 1,830 SNPs were found to be significantly associated with CM-specific survival (CMSS) (P ≤ 0.050 and false-positive report probability ≤ 0.2), of which nine SNPs were validated in the Harvard study (P ≤ 0.050). Among these, three independent SNPs (i.e., PDE1A rs6750552 T>C, ITPR1 rs6785564 A>G and RYR3 rs2596191 C>A) had a predictive role in CMSS, with a meta-analysis derived hazards ratio (HR) of 1.52 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.19-1.94, P = 7.21×10-4]], 0.49 (0.33-0.73, 3.94×10-4) and 0.67 (0.53-0.86, 0.0017), respectively. Patients with an increasing number of protective genotypes had remarkably improved CMSS. Additional expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) analysis showed that these genotypes were also significantly associated with mRNA expression levels of the genes. Taken together, these results may help us to identify prospective biomarkers in the calcium signaling pathway for CM prognosis.Item Open Access Genetic variants in the metzincin metallopeptidase family genes predict melanoma survival.(Molecular carcinogenesis, 2018-01) Xu, Yinghui; Wang, Yanru; Liu, Hongliang; Shi, Qiong; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Hyslop, Terry; Li, Xin; Han, Jiali; Wei, QingyiMetzincins are key molecules in the degradation of the extracellular matrix and play an important role in cellular processes such as cell migration, adhesion, and cell fusion of malignant tumors, including cutaneous melanoma (CM). We hypothesized that genetic variants of the metzincin metallopeptidase family genes would be associated with CM-specific survival (CMSS). To test this hypothesis, we first performed Cox proportional hazards regression analysis to evaluate the associations between genetic variants of 75 metzincin metallopeptidase family genes and CMSS using the dataset from the genome-wide association study (GWAS) from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) which included 858 non-Hispanic white patients with CM, and then validated using the dataset from the Harvard GWAS study which had 409 non-Hispanic white patients with invasive CM. Four independent SNPs (MMP16 rs10090371 C>A, ADAMTS3 rs788935 T>C, TLL2 rs10882807 T>C and MMP9 rs3918251 A>G) were identified as predictors of CMSS, with a variant-allele attributed hazards ratio (HR) of 1.73 (1.32-2.29, 9.68E-05), 1.46 (1.15-1.85, 0.002), 1.68 (1.31-2.14, 3.32E-05) and 0.67 (0.51-0.87, 0.003), respectively, in the meta-analysis of these two GWAS studies. Combined analysis of risk genotypes of these four SNPs revealed a decreased CMSS in a dose-response manner as the number of risk genotypes increased (Ptrend < 0.001). An improvement was observed in the prediction model (area under the curve [AUC] = 81.4% vs. 78.6%), when these risk genotypes were added to the model containing non-genotyping variables. Our findings suggest that these genetic variants may be promising prognostic biomarkers for CMSS.Item Open Access Genetic variants in TKT and DERA in the nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate pathway predict melanoma survival.(European journal of cancer (Oxford, England : 1990), 2020-07-09) Gu, Ning; Dai, Wei; Liu, Hongliang; Ge, Jie; Luo, Sheng; Cho, Eunyoung; Amos, Christopher I; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Nan, Hongmei; Yuan, Hua; Wei, QingyiBACKGROUND:Cutaneous melanoma (CM) is the most lethal type of skin cancers. Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) plays an important role in anabolic reactions and tumorigenesis, but many genes are involved in the NADPH system. METHODS:We used 10,912 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) (2018 genotyped and 8894 imputed) in 134 NADPH-related genes from a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of 858 patients from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) in a single-locus analysis to predict CM survival. We then replicated the results in another GWAS data set of 409 patients from the Nurses' Health Study (NHS) and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS). RESULTS:There were 95 of 858 (11.1%) and 48 of 409 (11.7%) patients who died of CM, respectively. In multivariable Cox regression analyses, we identified two independent SNPs (TKT rs9864057 G > A and deoxyribose phosphate aldolase (DERA) rs12297652 A > G) to be significantly associated with CM-specific survival [hazards ratio (HR) of 1.52, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.18-1.96, P = 1.06 × 10-3 and 1.51 (1.19-1.91, 5.89 × 10-4)] in the meta-analysis, respectively. Furthermore, an increasing number of risk genotypes of these two SNPs was associated with a higher risk of death in the MDACC, the NHS/HPFS, and their combined data sets (Ptrend<0.001, = 0.004 and <0.001, respectively). In the expression quantitative trait loci analysis, TKT rs9864057 G > A and DERA rs12297652 A > G were also significantly associated with higher mRNA expression levels in sun-exposed lower-leg skin (P = 0.043 and 0.006, respectively). CONCLUSIONS:These results suggest that these two potentially functional SNPs may be valuable prognostic biomarkers for CM survival, but larger studies are needed to validate these findings.Item Open Access Genetic variants of PDGF signaling pathway genes predict cutaneous melanoma survival.(Oncotarget, 2017-09) Li, Hong; Wang, Yanru; Liu, Hongliang; Shi, Qiong; Li, Hongyu; Wu, Wenting; Zhu, Dakai; Amos, Christopher I; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Yi; Han, Jiali; Wei, QingyiTo investigate whether genetic variants of platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) signaling pathway genes are associated with survival of cutaneous melanoma (CM) patients, we assessed associations of single-nucleotide polymorphisms in PDGF pathway with melanoma-specific survival in 858 CM patients of M.D. Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC). Additional data of 409 cases from Harvard University were also included for further analysis. We identified 13 SNPs in four genes (COL6A3, NCK2, COL5A1 and PRKCD) with a nominal P < 0.05 and false discovery rate (FDR) < 0.2 in MDACC dataset. Based on linkage disequilibrium, functional prediction and minor allele frequency, a representative SNP in each gene was selected. In the meta-analysis using MDACC and Harvard datasets, there were two SNPs associated with poor survival of CM patients: rs6707820 C>T in NCK2 (HR = 1.87, 95% CI = 1.35-2.59, Pmeta= 1.53E-5); and rs2306574 T>C in PRKCD (HR = 1.73, 95% CI = 1.33-2.24, Pmeta= 4.56E-6). Moreover, CM patients in MDACC with combined risk genotypes of these two loci had markedly poorer survival (HR = 2.47, 95% CI = 1.58-3.84, P < 0.001). Genetic variants of rs6707820 C>T in NCK2 and rs2306574 T>C in PRKCD of the PDGF signaling pathway may be biomarkers for melanoma survival.Item Open Access Genetic variants of PTPN2 are associated with lung cancer risk: a re-analysis of eight GWASs in the TRICL-ILCCO consortium.(Scientific reports, 2017-04-11) Feng, Yun; Wang, Yanru; Liu, Hongliang; Liu, Zhensheng; Mills, Coleman; Han, Younghun; Hung, Rayjean J; Brhane, Yonathan; McLaughlin, John; Brennan, Paul; Bickeboeller, Heike; Rosenberger, Albert; Houlston, Richard S; Caporaso, Neil E; Teresa Landi, Maria; Brueske, Irene; Risch, Angela; Ye, Yuanqing; Wu, Xifeng; Christiani, David C; Amos, Christopher I; Wei, QingyiThe T-cell protein tyrosine phosphatase (TCPTP) pathway consists of signaling events mediated by TCPTP. Mutations and genetic variants of some genes in the TCPTP pathway are associated with lung cancer risk and survival. In the present study, we first investigated associations of 5,162 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 43 genes of this TCPTP pathway with lung cancer risk by using summary data of six published genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of 12,160 cases and 16,838 controls. We identified 11 independent SNPs in eight genes after correction for multiple comparisons by a false discovery rate <0.20. Then, we performed in silico functional analyses for these 11 SNPs by eQTL analysis, two of which, PTPN2 SNPs rs2847297 and rs2847282, were chosen as tagSNPs. We further included two additional GWAS datasets of Harvard University (984 cases and 970 controls) and deCODE (1,319 cases and 26,380 controls), and the overall effects of these two SNPs among all eight GWAS studies remained significant (OR = 0.95, 95% CI = 0.92-0.98, and P = 0.004 for rs2847297; OR = 0.95, 95% CI = 0.92-0.99, and P = 0.009 for rs2847282). In conclusion, the PTPN2 rs2847297 and rs2847282 may be potential susceptible loci for lung cancer risk.Item Open Access Genetic variants of SDCCAG8 and MAGI2 in mitosis-related pathway genes are independent predictors of cutaneous melanoma-specific survival.(Cancer science, 2021-08-10) He, Yuanmin; Liu, Hongliang; Luo, Sheng; Amos, Christopher I; Lee, Jeffrey E; Li, Xin; Nan, Hongmei; Wei, QingyiMitosis is a prognostic factor for cutaneous melanoma (CM), but accurate mitosis detection in CM tissues is difficult. Therefore, the 8th Edition of the American Joint Committee on Cancer staging system has removed mitotic rate as a category criterion of the tumor T-category, based on the evidence that mitotic rate was not an independent prognostic factor for melanoma survival. Since single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have been shown to be potential predictors for cutaneous melanoma-specific survival (CMSS), we investigated the potential prognostic value of SNPs in mitosis-related pathway genes in CMSS by analyzing their associations with outcomes of 850 CM patients from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in a discovery dataset and validated the findings in another dataset of 409 CM patients from the Harvard University Nurses' Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-up Study. In both datasets, we identified two SNPs (SDCCAG8 rs10803138 G>A and MAGI2 rs3807694 C>T) as independent prognostic factors for CMSS, with adjusted allelic hazards ratios of 1.49 (95% confidence interval=1.17-1.90, P=0.001) and 1.45 (1.13-1.86, P=0.003), respectively. Furthermore, their combined unfavorable alleles also predicted poor survival in both discovery and validation datasets in a dose-response manner (Ptrend =0.0006 and 0.0001, respectively). Additional functional analysis revealed that both SDCCAG8 rs10803138 A and MAGI2 rs3807694 T alleles were associated with elevated mRNA expression levels in normal tissues. Therefore, these findings suggest that SDCCAG8 rs10803138 G>A and MAGI2 rs3807694 C>T are independent prognostic biomarkers for CMSS, possibly by regulating the mRNA expression of the corresponding genes involved in mitosis.Item Open Access Genome-wide association studies identify susceptibility loci for epithelial ovarian cancer in east Asian women.(Gynecologic oncology, 2019-03-19) Lawrenson, Kate; Song, Fengju; Hazelett, Dennis J; Kar, Siddhartha P; Tyrer, Jonathan; Phelan, Catherine M; Corona, Rosario I; Rodríguez-Malavé, Norma I; Seo, Ji-Hei; Adler, Emily; Coetzee, Simon G; Segato, Felipe; Fonseca, Marcos AS; Amos, Christopher I; Carney, Michael E; Chenevix-Trench, Georgia; Choi, Jiyeob; Doherty, Jennifer A; Jia, Weihua; Jin, Gang J; Kim, Byoung-Gie; Le, Nhu D; Lee, Juyeon; Li, Lian; Lim, Boon K; Adenan, Noor A; Mizuno, Mika; Park, Boyoung; Pearce, Celeste L; Shan, Kang; Shi, Yongyong; Shu, Xiao-Ou; Sieh, Weiva; Australian Ovarian Cancer Study Group; Thompson, Pamela J; Wilkens, Lynne R; Wei, Qingyi; Woo, Yin L; Yan, Li; Karlan, Beth Y; Freedman, Matthew L; Noushmehr, Houtan; Goode, Ellen L; Berchuck, Andrew; Sellers, Thomas A; Teo, Soo-Hwang; Zheng, Wei; Matsuo, Keitaro; Park, Sue; Chen, Kexin; Pharoah, Paul DP; Gayther, Simon A; Goodman, Marc TOBJECTIVE:Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) for epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) have focused largely on populations of European ancestry. We aimed to identify common germline variants associated with EOC risk in Asian women. METHODS:Genotyping was performed as part of the OncoArray project. Samples with >60% Asian ancestry were included in the analysis. Genotyping was performed on 533,631 SNPs in 3238 Asian subjects diagnosed with invasive or borderline EOC and 4083 unaffected controls. After imputation, genotypes were available for 11,595,112 SNPs to identify associations. RESULTS:At chromosome 6p25.2, SNP rs7748275 was associated with risk of serous EOC (odds ratio [OR] = 1.34, P = 8.7 × 10-9) and high-grade serous EOC (HGSOC) (OR = 1.34, P = 4.3 × 10-9). SNP rs6902488 at 6p25.2 (r2 = 0.97 with rs7748275) lies in an active enhancer and is predicted to impact binding of STAT3, P300 and ELF1. We identified additional risk loci with low Bayesian false discovery probability (BFDP) scores, indicating they are likely to be true risk associations (BFDP <10%). At chromosome 20q11.22, rs74272064 was associated with HGSOC risk (OR = 1.27, P = 9.0 × 10-8). Overall EOC risk was associated with rs10260419 at chromosome 7p21.3 (OR = 1.33, P = 1.2 × 10-7) and rs74917072 at chromosome 2q37.3 (OR = 1.25, P = 4.7 × 10-7). At 2q37.3, expression quantitative trait locus analysis in 404 HGSOC tissues identified ESPNL as a putative candidate susceptibility gene (P = 1.2 × 10-7). CONCLUSION:While some risk loci were shared between East Asian and European populations, others were population-specific, indicating that the landscape of EOC risk in Asian women has both shared and unique features compared to women of European ancestry.Item Open Access Genome-wide association study identifies a new melanoma susceptibility locus at 1q21.3.(Nature genetics, 2011-10-09) Macgregor, Stuart; Montgomery, Grant W; Liu, Jimmy Z; Zhao, Zhen Zhen; Henders, Anjali K; Stark, Mitchell; Schmid, Helen; Holland, Elizabeth A; Duffy, David L; Zhang, Mingfeng; Painter, Jodie N; Nyholt, Dale R; Maskiell, Judith A; Jetann, Jodie; Ferguson, Megan; Cust, Anne E; Jenkins, Mark A; Whiteman, David C; Olsson, Håkan; Puig, Susana; Bianchi-Scarrà, Giovanna; Hansson, Johan; Demenais, Florence; Landi, Maria Teresa; Dębniak, Tadeusz; Mackie, Rona; Azizi, Esther; Bressac-de Paillerets, Brigitte; Goldstein, Alisa M; Kanetsky, Peter A; Gruis, Nelleke A; Elder, David E; Newton-Bishop, Julia A; Bishop, D Timothy; Iles, Mark M; Helsing, Per; Amos, Christopher I; Wei, Qingyi; Wang, Li-E; Lee, Jeffrey E; Qureshi, Abrar A; Kefford, Richard F; Giles, Graham G; Armstrong, Bruce K; Aitken, Joanne F; Han, Jiali; Hopper, John L; Trent, Jeffrey M; Brown, Kevin M; Martin, Nicholas G; Mann, Graham J; Hayward, Nicholas KWe performed a genome-wide association study of melanoma in a discovery cohort of 2,168 Australian individuals with melanoma and 4,387 control individuals. In this discovery phase, we confirm several previously characterized melanoma-associated loci at MC1R, ASIP and MTAP-CDKN2A. We selected variants at nine loci for replication in three independent case-control studies (Europe: 2,804 subjects with melanoma, 7,618 control subjects; United States 1: 1,804 subjects with melanoma, 1,026 control subjects; United States 2: 585 subjects with melanoma, 6,500 control subjects). The combined meta-analysis of all case-control studies identified a new susceptibility locus at 1q21.3 (rs7412746, P = 9.0 × 10(-11), OR in combined replication cohorts of 0.89 (95% CI 0.85-0.95)). We also show evidence suggesting that melanoma associates with 1q42.12 (rs3219090, P = 9.3 × 10(-8)). The associated variants at the 1q21.3 locus span a region with ten genes, and plausible candidate genes for melanoma susceptibility include ARNT and SETDB1. Variants at the 1q21.3 locus do not seem to be associated with human pigmentation or measures of nevus density.Item Open Access Genome-wide association study identifies three new melanoma susceptibility loci.(Nature genetics, 2011-10-09) Barrett, Jennifer H; Iles, Mark M; Harland, Mark; Taylor, John C; Aitken, Joanne F; Andresen, Per Arne; Akslen, Lars A; Armstrong, Bruce K; Avril, Marie-Francoise; Azizi, Esther; Bakker, Bert; Bergman, Wilma; Bianchi-Scarrà, Giovanna; Bressac-de Paillerets, Brigitte; Calista, Donato; Cannon-Albright, Lisa A; Corda, Eve; Cust, Anne E; Dębniak, Tadeusz; Duffy, David; Dunning, Alison M; Easton, Douglas F; Friedman, Eitan; Galan, Pilar; Ghiorzo, Paola; Giles, Graham G; Hansson, Johan; Hocevar, Marko; Höiom, Veronica; Hopper, John L; Ingvar, Christian; Janssen, Bart; Jenkins, Mark A; Jönsson, Göran; Kefford, Richard F; Landi, Giorgio; Landi, Maria Teresa; Lang, Julie; Lubiński, Jan; Mackie, Rona; Malvehy, Josep; Martin, Nicholas G; Molven, Anders; Montgomery, Grant W; van Nieuwpoort, Frans A; Novakovic, Srdjan; Olsson, Håkan; Pastorino, Lorenza; Puig, Susana; Puig-Butille, Joan Anton; Randerson-Moor, Juliette; Snowden, Helen; Tuominen, Rainer; Van Belle, Patricia; van der Stoep, Nienke; Whiteman, David C; Zelenika, Diana; Han, Jiali; Fang, Shenying; Lee, Jeffrey E; Wei, Qingyi; Lathrop, G Mark; Gillanders, Elizabeth M; Brown, Kevin M; Goldstein, Alisa M; Kanetsky, Peter A; Mann, Graham J; Macgregor, Stuart; Elder, David E; Amos, Christopher I; Hayward, Nicholas K; Gruis, Nelleke A; Demenais, Florence; Bishop, Julia A Newton; Bishop, D Timothy; GenoMEL ConsortiumWe report a genome-wide association study for melanoma that was conducted by the GenoMEL Consortium. Our discovery phase included 2,981 individuals with melanoma and 1,982 study-specific control individuals of European ancestry, as well as an additional 6,426 control subjects from French or British populations, all of whom were genotyped for 317,000 or 610,000 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Our analysis replicated previously known melanoma susceptibility loci. Seven new regions with at least one SNP with P < 10(-5) and further local imputed or genotyped support were selected for replication using two other genome-wide studies (from Australia and Texas, USA). Additional replication came from case-control series from the UK and The Netherlands. Variants at three of the seven loci replicated at P < 10(-3): an SNP in ATM (rs1801516, overall P = 3.4 × 10(-9)), an SNP in MX2 (rs45430, P = 2.9 × 10(-9)) and an SNP adjacent to CASP8 (rs13016963, P = 8.6 × 10(-10)). A fourth locus near CCND1 remains of potential interest, showing suggestive but inconclusive evidence of replication (rs1485993, overall P = 4.6 × 10(-7) under a fixed-effects model and P = 1.2 × 10(-3) under a random-effects model). These newly associated variants showed no association with nevus or pigmentation phenotypes in a large British case-control series.