Cookie Settings

We use cookies to optimize our website. These include cookies that are necessary for the operation of the site, as well as those that are only used for anonymous statistic. You can decide for yourself which categories you want to allow. Further information can be found in our data privacy protection .

Essential

These cookies are necessary to run the core functionalities of this website and cannot be disabled.

Name Webedition CMS
Purpose This cookie is required by the CMS (Content Management System) Webedition for the system to function correctly. Typically, this cookie is deleted when the browser is closed.
Name econda
Purpose Session cookie emos_jcsid for the web analysis software econda. This runs in the “anonymized measurement” mode. There is no personal reference. As soon as the user leaves the site, tracking is ended and all data in the browser are automatically deleted.
Statistics

These cookies help us understand how visitors interact with our website by collecting and analyzing information anonymously. Depending on the tool, one or more cookies are set by the provider.

Name econda
Purpose Statistics
External media

Content from external media platforms is blocked by default. If cookies from external media are accepted, access to this content no longer requires manual consent.

Name YouTube
Purpose Show YouTube content
Name Twitter
Purpose activate Twitter Feeds

New brain cancer types emerge based on molecular characteristics

No. 10 | 26/02/2016 | by Koh

An international team headed by scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg University Hospital and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has conducted a comprehensive molecular analysis of a subgroup of so-called primitive brain tumors in children. They found that the majority of cases with this pathologic diagnosis have molecular features that correspond to those of other types of brain cancer and must therefore be treated in the same way. Based on molecular characteristics, the researchers classified another part of the tumors into four new types, which also vary in their clinical features. In the future, this classification may help assign patients to appropriate clinical trials. The researchers have now published their results in the journal CELL.
Joint press release of the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and Heidelberg University Hospital

Diagnosis „primitive neuroectodermal tumor of the CNS“: Tumor cells are small and poorly differentiated
© Dominik Sturm, DKFZ/Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg

Many childhood brain tumors arise from extremely immature and undifferentiated cells of the central nervous system (CNS) and are therefore referred to as embryonal tumors. These include, for example, medulloblastomas, which always occur in the cerebellum. A large part of embryonal brain tumors that are located above the cerebellum are grouped as primitive neuroectodermal tumors of the central nervous system (CNS PNET). About 10 children and 40 adults are diagnosed with this type of cancer in Germany every year. These brain tumors grow extremely rapidly and aggressively and are difficult to treat.

“More recent studies have revealed that PNET are a group of heterogeneous cancers,” says Andrey Korshunov, a neuropathologist who works at the DKFZ and Heidelberg University Hospital. “However, precise diagnosis is difficult because there are no molecular markers and in histologic differentiation of tumor tissue under the microscope there are overlaps with many other types of brain cancer.”

In order to facilitate better classification of these dangerous tumors and, thus, more precise and eventually more successful treatment for each individual patient, an international research group led by Marcel Kool from the DKFZ and David Ellison from St. Jude, (Memphis, Tenn., USA)  launched a large-scale study in which researchers conducted a comprehensive molecular and histologic analysis of tissue samples from over 300 CNS PNET cases.

In the first step, the investigators mapped the distribution of methyl labels in the tumor genomes. By comparing these methylation profiles with reference tumors, they recognized that approximately two thirds of the presumed CNS PNET could be grouped with other known CNS tumor types. In many cases, this observation was additionally supported by histologic re evaluation of the tumor tissue.

“This result shows how important molecular analysis of these primitive tumors is. In many cases, our new classification suggests completely different treatment options,” says pediatrician and molecular geneticist Dominik Sturm, who is one of the first authors of the article.  At St. Jude, the study was directed by first author and neuropathologist Brent Orr.

The researchers were able to classify the bulk of the remaining tumors in four new, previously unknown tumor types, which exhibit significant differences as to patients' age and gender as well as clinical course. Further analyses such as gene activity profiles, determining the copy number of chromosomes as well as DNA sequencing revealed a characteristic genetic alteration for each of the four new tumor types in addition to their specific DNA methylation profiles. In contrast, it was difficult to distinguish these groups based solely on their histologic features.

“Based on the molecular tumor profiles, we can assign affected patients to future clinical trials that make sense for them,” Sturm explains. ”The tumors in the four newly described groups differ from all previously known brain tumors markedly enough to speak of new tumor types. We expect that they also vary in their response to chemotherapy and targeted drugs.” The molecular analysis has already yielded first clues about potential targets in the individual tumor groups.

This research shows the importance of international collaborations in the study of rare types of cancer. This comprehensive study would not have been possible without the linkage of two of the world’s largest research centers with a focus on pediatric oncology, the DKFZ in cooperation with Heidelberg University Hospital and St. Jude.

The project was supported, among other sources, by German Cancer Aid (Deutschen Krebshilfe), the German Childhood Cancer Foundation (Deutsche Kinderkrebsstiftung), the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and ALSAC (Memphis, USA).

Dominik Sturm, Brent A. Orr, Umut H. Toprak, Volker Hovestadt, David T. W. Jones, David Capper, Martin Sill, Ivo Buchhalter, Paul A. Northcott, Irina
Leis, Marina Ryzhova, Christian Koelsche, Elke Pfaff, Sariah J. Allen, Gnanaprakash Balasubramanian, Barbara C. Worst, Kristian W. Pajtler, Sebastian Brabetz, Pascal D. Johann, Felix Sahm, Jüri Reimand, Alan Mackay, Diana M. Carvalho, Marc Remke, Joanna J. Phillips, Arie Perry, Cynthia Cowdrey, Rachid Drissi, Maryam Fouladi, Felice Giangaspero, Maria Łastowska, Wiesława Grajkowska, Wolfram Scheurlen, Torsten Pietsch, Christian Hagel, Johannes Gojo, Daniela Lötsch, Walter Berger, Irene Slavc, Christine Haberler, Anne Jouvet, Stefan Holm, Silvia Hofer, Marco Prinz, Catherine Keohane, Iris Fried, Christian Mawrin, David Scheie, Bret C. Mobley, Matthew J. Schniederjan, Mariarita Santi, Anna M. Buccoliero, Sonika Dahiya, Christof M. Kramm, André O. von Bueren, Katja von Hoff, Stefan Rutkowski, Christel Herold-Mende, Michael C. Frühwald, Till Milde, Martin Hasselblatt, Pieter Wesseling, Jochen Rößler, Ulrich Schüller, Martin Ebinger, Jens Schittenhelm, Stephan Frank, Rainer Grobholz, Istvan Vajtai, Volkmar Hans, Reinhard Schneppenheim, Karel Zitterbart, V. Peter Collins, Eleonora Aronica, Pascale Varlet, Stephanie Puget, Christelle Dufour, Jacques Grill, Dominique Figarella-Branger, Marietta Wolter, Martin U. Schuhmann, Tarek Shalaby, Michael Grotzer, Timothy van Meter, Camelia-Maria Monoranu, Jörg Felsberg, Guido Reifenberger, Matija Snuderl, Lynn Ann Forrester, Jan Koster, Rogier Versteeg, Richard Volckmann, Peter van Sluis, Stephan Wolf, Tom Mikkelsen, Amar Gajjar, Kenneth Aldape, Andrew S. Moore, Michael D. Taylor, Chris Jones, Nada Jabado Matthias A. Karajannis, Roland Eils, Matthias Schlesner, Peter Lichter, Andreas von Deimling, Stefan M. Pfister, David W. Ellison, Andrey Korshunov, and Marcel Kool:
New Brain Tumor Entities Emerge from Molecular Classification of CNS-PNETs, CELL 2016, DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2016.01.015

With more than 3,000 employees, the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ) is Germany’s largest biomedical research institute. DKFZ scientists identify cancer risk factors, investigate how cancer progresses and develop new cancer prevention strategies. They are also developing new methods to diagnose tumors more precisely and treat cancer patients more successfully. The DKFZ's Cancer Information Service (KID) provides patients, interested citizens and experts with individual answers to questions relating to cancer.

To transfer promising approaches from cancer research to the clinic and thus improve the prognosis of cancer patients, the DKFZ cooperates with excellent research institutions and university hospitals throughout Germany:

  • National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT, 6 sites)
  • German Cancer Consortium (DKTK, 8 sites)
  • Hopp Children's Cancer Center (KiTZ) Heidelberg
  • Helmholtz Institute for Translational Oncology (HI-TRON Mainz) - A Helmholtz Institute of the DKFZ
  • DKFZ-Hector Cancer Institute at the University Medical Center Mannheim
  • National Cancer Prevention Center (jointly with German Cancer Aid)
The DKFZ is 90 percent financed by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and 10 percent by the state of Baden-Württemberg. The DKFZ is a member of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers.

RSS-Feed

Subscribe to our RSS-Feed.

to top
powered by webEdition CMS