Systematic Elucidation and Validation of OncoProtein-Centric Molecular Interaction Maps

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua Broyde ◽  
David R. Simpson ◽  
Diana Murray ◽  
Federico M. Giorgi ◽  
Alexander Lachmann ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTThe largely incomplete and tissue-independent nature of cancer pathways represents a key limitation to the ability to elucidate mechanistic determinants of cancer phenotypes and to predict adaptive response to targeted therapy. To address these challenges, we propose replacing canonical cancer pathways with a more accurate, comprehensive, and context-specific architecture – dubbed a Protein-Centric molecular interaction Map (PC-Map) – representing modulators, effectors, and cognate binding-partners of any oncoprotein of interest. To reconstruct these complex molecular architectures de novo, we introduce a novel OncoSig algorithm. Validation of a lung adenocarcinoma specific (LUAD) KRAS-centric PC-Map recapitulated known KRAS biology and, more critically, identified a novel repertoire of proteins eliciting synthetic lethality in KRASG12D LUAD organoid cultures. Showing the generalizable nature of the algorithm, we elucidated PC-Maps for ten recurrently mutated oncoproteins, including KRAS, in distinct tumor contexts. This revealed a highly context-specific nature of cancer’s regulatory and signaling architectures to an unprecedented degree of resolution.

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (20) ◽  
pp. eabf5835
Author(s):  
Wen Zhang ◽  
Peter G. Hawkins ◽  
Jing He ◽  
Namita T. Gupta ◽  
Jinrui Liu ◽  
...  

T cell receptor (TCR) antigen–specific recognition is essential for the adaptive immune system. However, building a TCR-antigen interaction map has been challenging due to the staggering diversity of TCRs and antigens. Accordingly, highly multiplexed dextramer-TCR binding assays have been recently developed, but the utility of the ensuing large datasets is limited by the lack of robust computational methods for normalization and interpretation. Here, we present a computational framework comprising a novel method, ICON (Integrative COntext-specific Normalization), for identifying reliable TCR-pMHC (peptide–major histocompatibility complex) interactions and a neural network–based classifier TCRAI that outperforms other state-of-the-art methods for TCR-antigen specificity prediction. We further demonstrated that by combining ICON and TCRAI, we are able to discover novel subgroups of TCRs that bind to a given pMHC via different mechanisms. Our framework facilitates the identification and understanding of TCR-antigen–specific interactions for basic immunological research and clinical immune monitoring.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Huihui Li ◽  
Mingzhe Xie ◽  
Yan Wang ◽  
Ludong Yang ◽  
Zhi Xie ◽  
...  

AbstractriboCIRC is a translatome data-oriented circRNA database specifically designed for hosting, exploring, analyzing, and visualizing translatable circRNAs from multi-species. The database provides a comprehensive repository of computationally predicted ribosome-associated circRNAs; a manually curated collection of experimentally verified translated circRNAs; an evaluation of cross-species conservation of translatable circRNAs; a systematic de novo annotation of putative circRNA-encoded peptides, including sequence, structure, and function; and a genome browser to visualize the context-specific occupant footprints of circRNAs. It represents a valuable resource for the circRNA research community and is publicly available at http://www.ribocirc.com.


2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (41) ◽  
pp. e2104832118
Author(s):  
Vinod K. Mony ◽  
Anna Drangowska-Way ◽  
Reka Albert ◽  
Emma Harrison ◽  
Abbas Ghaddar ◽  
...  

Plasticity in multicellular organisms involves signaling pathways converting contexts—either natural environmental challenges or laboratory perturbations—into context-specific changes in gene expression. Congruently, the interactions between the signaling molecules and transcription factors (TF) regulating these responses are also context specific. However, when a target gene responds across contexts, the upstream TF identified in one context is often inferred to regulate it across contexts. Reconciling these stable TF–target gene pair inferences with the context-specific nature of homeostatic responses is therefore needed. The induction of the Caenorhabditis elegans genes lipl-3 and lipl-4 is observed in many genetic contexts and is essential to survival during fasting. We find DAF-16/FOXO mediating lipl-4 induction in all contexts tested; hence, lipl-4 regulation seems context independent and compatible with across-context inferences. In contrast, DAF-16–mediated regulation of lipl-3 is context specific. DAF-16 reduces the induction of lipl-3 during fasting, yet it promotes it during oxidative stress. Through discrete dynamic modeling and genetic epistasis, we define that DAF-16 represses HLH-30/TFEB—the main TF activating lipl-3 during fasting. Contrastingly, DAF-16 activates the stress-responsive TF HSF-1 during oxidative stress, which promotes C. elegans survival through induction of lipl-3. Furthermore, the TF MXL-3 contributes to the dominance of HSF-1 at the expense of HLH-30 during oxidative stress but not during fasting. This study shows how context-specific diverting of functional interactions within a molecular network allows cells to specifically respond to a large number of contexts with a limited number of molecular players, a mode of transcriptional regulation we name “contextualized transcription.”


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xi Chen ◽  
Jinghua Gu ◽  
Andrew F. Neuwald ◽  
Leena Hilakivi-Clarke ◽  
Robert Clarke ◽  
...  

Abstract Genome-wide transcription factor (TF) binding signal analyses reveal co-localization of TF binding sites, based on which cis-regulatory modules (CRMs) can be inferred. CRMs play a key role in understanding the cooperation of multiple TFs under specific conditions. However, the functions of CRMs and their effects on nearby gene transcription are highly dynamic and context-specific and therefore are challenging to characterize. BICORN (Bayesian Inference of COoperative Regulatory Network) builds a hierarchical Bayesian model and infers context-specific CRMs based on TF-gene binding events and gene expression data for a particular cell type. BICORN automatically searches for a list of candidate CRMs based on the input TF bindings at regulatory regions associated with genes of interest. Applying Gibbs sampling, BICORN iteratively estimates model parameters of CRMs, TF activities, and corresponding regulation on gene transcription, which it models as a sparse network of functional CRMs regulating target genes. The BICORN package is implemented in R (version 3.4 or later) and is publicly available on the CRAN server at https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/BICORN/index.html.


Cancers ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 1682 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiang Deng ◽  
Shaoli Das ◽  
Kristin Valdez ◽  
Kevin Camphausen ◽  
Uma Shankavaram

Synthetic lethality exploits the phenomenon that a mutation in a cancer gene is often associated with new vulnerability which can be uniquely targeted therapeutically, leading to a significant increase in favorable outcome. DNA damage and survival pathways are among the most commonly mutated networks in human cancers. Recent data suggest that synthetic lethal interactions between a tumor defect and a DNA repair pathway can be used to preferentially kill tumor cells. We recently published a method, DiscoverSL, using multi-omic cancer data, that can predict synthetic lethal interactions of potential clinical relevance. Here, we apply the generality of our models in a comprehensive web tool called Synthetic Lethality Bio Discovery Portal (SL-BioDP) and extend the cancer types to 18 cancer genome atlas cohorts. SL-BioDP enables a data-driven computational approach to predict synthetic lethal interactions from hallmark cancer pathways by mining cancer’s genomic and chemical interactions. Our tool provides queries and visualizations for exploring potentially targetable synthetic lethal interactions, shows Kaplan–Meier plots of clinical relevance, and provides in silico validation using short hairpin RNA (shRNA) and drug efficacy data. Our method would thus shed light on mechanisms of synthetic lethal interactions and lead to the discovery of novel anticancer drugs.


2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kurt W Kohn ◽  
Mirit I Aladjem ◽  
Sohyoung Kim ◽  
John N Weinstein ◽  
Yves Pommier

Author(s):  
Kurt W Kohn ◽  
Mirit I Aladjem ◽  
Stefania Pasa ◽  
Silvio Parodi ◽  
Yves Pommier

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Serena Chen

The core premise of this article is that it is scientifically informative and psychologically meaningful to conceptualize and assess authenticity in context. I begin by providing some theoretical background on the nature of the self-concept, highlighting how the self-concept is composed of a collection of selves, with different selves activated and therefore at play in different contexts. This basic fact, that the self-concept is both multifaceted and malleable, implies that authenticity is a construct that requires study at a contextual level. I illustrate this by reviewing theory and findings from 3 areas of research, incorporating studies from my laboratory throughout. These areas are (a) authenticity in the context of close relationships; (b) authenticity in hierarchical contexts, wherein one occupies a lower versus higher position of social power; and (c) authenticity in relation to the larger cultural context. Finally, I address a number of issues and questions that arise when considering authenticity in context and propose a number of directions for future research on the context-specific nature of authenticity.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (601) ◽  
pp. eaay0482 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hilary E. Nicholson ◽  
Zeshan Tariq ◽  
Benjamin E. Housden ◽  
Rebecca B. Jennings ◽  
Laura A. Stransky ◽  
...  

Inactivation of the VHL tumor suppressor gene is the signature initiating event in clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC), the most common form of kidney cancer, and causes the accumulation of hypoxia-inducible factor 2α (HIF-2α). HIF-2α inhibitors are effective in some ccRCC cases, but both de novo and acquired resistance have been observed in the laboratory and in the clinic. Here, we identified synthetic lethality between decreased activity of cyclin-dependent kinases 4 and 6 (CDK4/6) and VHL inactivation in two species (human and Drosophila) and across diverse human ccRCC cell lines in culture and xenografts. Although HIF-2α transcriptionally induced the CDK4/6 partner cyclin D1, HIF-2α was not required for the increased CDK4/6 requirement of VHL−/− ccRCC cells. Accordingly, the antiproliferative effects of CDK4/6 inhibition were synergistic with HIF-2α inhibition in HIF-2α–dependent VHL−/− ccRCC cells and not antagonistic with HIF-2α inhibition in HIF-2α–independent cells. These findings support testing CDK4/6 inhibitors as treatments for ccRCC, alone and in combination with HIF-2α inhibitors.


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