New Perspectives of "omics" Applications in Melanoma Research

Recent advances in melanoma research via "omics" platforms

Melanoma has a high mortality rate and metastatic melanoma is highly resistant to conventional therapies. "Omics" fields such as proteomics and microRNA and exosome studies have provided new knowledge to complement the information generated by genomic studies. This work aimed to review the current status of biomarker discovery for melanoma through multi-"omics" platforms. A few sets of novel microRNAs and proteins are described, some of them with important implications in suppressing melanoma at different stages. Upregulation of genes involved in angiogenesis, immunosuppressive factors, modification of stroma, capture of melanoma cells in lymph nodes and factors responsible for tumour cell recruitment have been identified in exosomes, among molecules with other functions. A remarkable series of proteins involved in epithelial-mesenchymal/mesenchymal-epithelial transitions, inflammation, motility, proliferation and progression processes, centrosome amplification, aneuploidy, inhibition of CD8+ effector T-cells, and metastasis in general were identified. Genomic and protein-protein interactions or metabolome levels were not analysed. Proteomics tools such as Orbitrap shotgun mass spectrometry or deep mining proteomic analysis utilizing high-resolution reversed phase nanoseparation in combination with mass spectrometry are also discussed. The application of these tools together with bioinformatics approaches applied to the clinical setting will enable the implementation of personalized medicine in the near future.

In-depth genomic data analyses revealed complex transcriptional and epigenetic dysregulations of BRAFV600E in melanoma

BACKGROUND

The recurrent BRAF driver mutation V600E (BRAF (V600E)) is currently one of the most clinically relevant mutations in melanoma. However, the genome-wide transcriptional and epigenetic dysregulations induced by BRAF (V600E) are still unclear. The investigation of this driver mutation's functional consequences is critical to the understanding of tumorigenesis and the development of therapeutic strategies.

METHODS AND RESULTS

We performed an integrative analysis of transcriptomic and epigenomic changes disturbed by BRAF (V600E) by comparing the gene expression and methylation profiles of 34 primary cutaneous melanoma tumors harboring BRAF (V600E) with those of 27 BRAF (WT) samples available from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). A total of 711 significantly differentially expressed genes were identified as putative BRAF (V600E) target genes. Functional enrichment analyses revealed the transcription factor MITF (p < 3.6 × 10(-16)) and growth factor TGFB1 (p < 3.1 × 10(-9)) were the most significantly enriched up-regulators, with MITF being significantly up-regulated, whereas TGFB1 was significantly down-regulated in BRAF (V600E), suggesting that they may mediate tumorigenesis driven by BRAF (V600E). Further investigation using the MITF ChIP-Seq data confirmed that BRAF (V600E) led to an overall increased level of gene expression for the MITF targets. Furthermore, DNA methylation analysis revealed a global DNA methylation loss in BRAF (V600E) relative to BRAF (WT). This might be due to BRAF dysregulation of DNMT3A, which was identified as a potential target with significant down-regulation in BRAF (V600E). Finally, we demonstrated that BRAF (V600E) targets may play essential functional roles in cell growth and proliferation, measured by their effects on melanoma tumor growth using a short hairpin RNA silencing experimental dataset.

CONCLUSIONS

Our integrative analysis identified a set of BRAF (V600E) target genes. Further analyses suggested a complex mechanism driven by mutation BRAF (V600E) on melanoma tumorigenesis that disturbs specific cancer-related genes, pathways, and methylation modifications.

Epigenetics of human melanoma: promises and challenges

Melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer with rising incidence and mortality rates. Although early-stage melanoma is highly curable, advanced-stage melanoma is refractory to treatment. This underscores the importance of prevention and early detection as well as the need to improve treatment and prognostication of human melanoma. Elucidating the underlying mechanisms of the initiation and progression of human melanoma can help identify potential targets of intervention for prevention, diagnosis, therapy, and prognosis of this disease. Aberrant DNA methylation and histone modifications are the best-established epigenetic mechanisms of carcinogenesis. The occurrence of epigenetic changes prior to clinical diagnosis of cancer and their reversibility through pharmacologic/genetic approaches offer a promising avenue for basic and translational research on human melanoma. Candidate gene(s) or genome-wide aberrant DNA methylation and histone modifications have been observed in human melanoma tumor tissues and cell lines, and correlated to cellular and functional characteristics and/or clinicopathological features of this malignancy. The present review summarizes the published researches on aberrant DNA methylation and histone modifications in connection with human melanoma. Representative studies are highlighted to set forth the current state of knowledge, gaps in the knowledgebase, and future directions in these epigenetic fields of research. Examples of epigenetic therapy applied for human melanoma in vitro, and the challenges of its in vivo application for clinical treatment of solid tumors are discussed.

Proteomic analysis of proton beam irradiated human melanoma cells

Proton beam irradiation is a form of advanced radiotherapy providing superior distributions of a low LET radiation dose relative to that of photon therapy for the treatment of cancer. Even though this clinical treatment has been developing for several decades, the proton radiobiology critical to the optimization of proton radiotherapy is far from being understood. Proteomic changes were analyzed in human melanoma cells treated with a sublethal dose (3 Gy) of proton beam irradiation. The results were compared with untreated cells. Two-dimensional electrophoresis was performed with mass spectrometry to identify the proteins. At the dose of 3 Gy a minimal slowdown in proliferation rate was seen, as well as some DNA damage. After allowing time for damage repair, the proteomic analysis was performed. In total 17 protein levels were found to significantly (more than 1.5 times) change: 4 downregulated and 13 upregulated. Functionally, they represent four categories: (i) DNA repair and RNA regulation (VCP, MVP, STRAP, FAB-2, Lamine A/C, GAPDH), (ii) cell survival and stress response (STRAP, MCM7, Annexin 7, MVP, Caprin-1, PDCD6, VCP, HSP70), (iii) cell metabolism (TIM, GAPDH, VCP), and (iv) cytoskeleton and motility (Moesin, Actinin 4, FAB-2, Vimentin, Annexin 7, Lamine A/C, Lamine B). A substantial decrease (2.3 x) was seen in the level of vimentin, a marker of epithelial to mesenchymal transition and the metastatic properties of melanoma.