Targeting Pathogenic Variants in Hereditary Cancer Diagnosis and Screening

A special issue of Cancers (ISSN 2072-6694). This special issue belongs to the section "Cancer Causes, Screening and Diagnosis".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 10 November 2024 | Viewed by 357

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Medicine, Epidemiology & Population Sciences, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, Mailstop BCM305, Houston, TX 77030, USA
Interests: lung cancer; head and neck cancer; glioma; genetic epidemiology; risk prediction and early detection

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The application of next-generation sequencing, such as whole genome sequencing, whole exome sequencing, and target sequencing, has markedly accelerated the discovery of novel disease-causing genes and highly penetrant pathogenic variants. Studies have consistently shown that these pathogenic/loss-of-function variants tend to be evolutionarily recent, rare, and deleterious. As variant allele frequencies drop, their effect sizes can increase beyond the limits imposed by natural selection.   

This Special Issue will highlight the roles of low and rare pathogenic variants (including single-nucleotide variants, small insertions/deletions [Indels], and structural variants) in the risks and outcomes for a variety of diseases in family-based or population-based studies across different populations. Evaluating DNA-based germline pathogenic variants will facilitate early interventions and clinical diagnoses, lead to better treatment, improve prognosis, and provide insights into disease etiology and potential therapeutic targets.

Dr. Yanhong Liu
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • disease susceptibility
  • prognosis and outcomes
  • genetic association
  • genetic epidemiology
  • germline variants
  • pathogenic variants
  • rare variants
  • exome sequencing
  • whole genome sequencing
  • target sequencing

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

11 pages, 959 KiB  
Article
Mismatch Repair (MMR) Gene Mutation Carriers Have Favorable Outcome in Colorectal and Endometrial Cancer: A Prospective Cohort Study
by Jiunn-Tyng Yeh, Hung-Pin Peng, Fei-Hung Hung, Chen-Fang Hung, Ling-Ling Hsieh, An-Suei Yang and Yong Alison Wang
Cancers 2024, 16(13), 2342; https://doi.org/10.3390/cancers16132342 - 26 Jun 2024
Viewed by 216
Abstract
Germline (Lynch syndrome, LS) and somatic deficiencies of mismatch repair proteins (MMRd) are linked to colorectal and endometrial cancer; however, their prognostic impact in Asian populations remains unclear. This prospective cohort study aimed to determine the prevalence and outcome of germline and somatic [...] Read more.
Germline (Lynch syndrome, LS) and somatic deficiencies of mismatch repair proteins (MMRd) are linked to colorectal and endometrial cancer; however, their prognostic impact in Asian populations remains unclear. This prospective cohort study aimed to determine the prevalence and outcome of germline and somatic MMRd in cancer patients suspected of LS. Patients with colorectal or endometrial cancer suspected of LS were enrolled and underwent gene sequencing for germline MMRd (gMMRd) and immunohistochemistry staining of MMR proteins in a subset of the pathological samples (pMMRd). Among the 451 enrolled patients, 36 patients were gMMRd (+). Compared with gMMRd (−) patients, the 10-year relapse-free survival in gMMRd (+) patients was significantly higher (100% vs. 77.9%; p = 0.006), whereas the 10-year overall survival was similar (100% vs. 90.9%; p = 0.12). Among the 102 gMMRd (−) patients with available pMMR status, 13.7% were pMMRd (+). The 5-year relapse-free survival was 62.9% in gMMRd (−) pMMRd (+) patients and 35.0% in gMMRd (−) pMMRd (−) patients, both lower than gMMRd (+) patients (100%; p < 0.001). This study showed that having LS confers a favorable outcome in colorectal and endometrial cancer patients and highlights the importance of germline genetic testing following the detection of somatic MMRd. Full article
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