Abstract 3900: Plasma ctDNA multigene mutation analysis for the diagnosis and treatment monitoring of colorectal cancer patients
Authors: Michael J. Powell, Elena Peletskaya, Qing Sun, Jinwei Du, Larry Pastor, Jyoti Phatak, Jenny Wilding, Walter F. Bodmer, Aiguo Zhang
Journal: Cancer Research (2018)

Abstract Introduction Colorectal cancer is a highly preventable disease as early detection increases rates of patient survival to near 100%. Also during therapy colorectal tumors can develop resistance due to mutations in cellular growth factor receptor signaling pathway genes such as KRAS and BRAF. Herein we report new validation studies of a novel multigene mutation biomarker real-time PCR based assay for qualitative detection of colorectal cancer associated mutations including the tumor suppressor APC, growth factor signaling pathway genes KRAS and BRAF and the essential WNT pathway signaling gene Beta- catenin (CTNNB1) called ColoScapeTM .The assay allows the sensitive detection of the presence or absence of mutations in the targeted regions of the genes interrogated. While tumor-tissue remains the ‘gold standard' for genetic analysis in cancer patients, it is challenged with the advent of circulating cell-free tumor DNA (ctDNA) analysis from blood samples; so called 'liquid biopsy'. Here we broaden our previous study on the initial validation of FFPE samples to include plasma DNA in colorectal cancer patients and by evaluating its clinical utility as a method for monitoring tumor ctDNA mutations during and after therapy as well as a potential screening test for early diagnosis of colorectal cancer. Methodology he high sensitivity of this multigene biomarker assay is achieved due to xenonucleic acid (XNA) probe technology. XNA probes are novel backbone modified oligomers having natural nucleoside bases (A,T,C and G) that hybridize by Watson-Crick base pairing to natural DNA and RNA with much higher binding affinity than natural deoxyribonucleic acid oligomers of the same sequence. XNA probes are designed that bind to the selected wild-type sequences at the respective genetic loci in the target genes. These XNA probes have a much higher Tm than the primer annealing temperature and suppress amplification of WT DNA templates and only allow amplification of the target mutant DNA templates in the sample. Both single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP's) and insertion/deletions (indels) mutations can be detected. Performance parameters of the assay were established on DNA of colorectal cancer patients extracted from FFPE as well as reference DNA materials (synthetic and cell line derived DNA). This study presents further validation of the test as a potential landmark clinical test for colorectal cancer initial detection in FIT posiive patients and for recurrence and therapy monitoring Conclusion: The ColoScapeTM Colorectal Cancer Mutation Detection assay is shown to be a sensitive tool intended to facilitate research in Colon Cancer development, early detection, disease monitoring and therapeutic interventions. Citation Format: Michael J. Powell, Elena Peletskaya, Qing Sun, Jinwei Du, Larry Pastor, Jyoti Phatak, Jenny Wilding, Walter F. Bodmer, Aiguo Zhang. Plasma ctDNA multigene mutation analysis for the diagnosis and treatment monitoring of colorectal cancer patients [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2018; 2018 Apr 14-18; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2018;78(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 3900.