brain tumors; gene expression; signal transduction; transcription factors
Abstract :
[en] Gliomas frequently display constitutive activation of the transcription factor STAT3, a protein that is known to be able to mediate neoplastic transformation. STAT3 regulates genes that play a central role in cellular survival, proliferation, self-renewal, and invasion, and a cohort of STAT3 target genes have been found that are commonly coexpressed in human cancers. Thus, these genes likely subserve the transforming ability of constitutively activated STAT3. To determine whether the coordinated expression of STAT3 target genes is present in a subset of human gliomas, and whether this changes the biology of these tumors in patients, gene expression analysis was performed in four distinct human glioma data sets for which patient survival information was available. Coordinate expression of STAT3 targets was significantly associated with poor patient outcome in each data set. Specifically, patients with tumors displaying high expression of STAT3 targets had a shorter median survival time compared to patients whose tumors had low expression of STAT3 targets. These data suggest that constitutively activated STAT3 in gliomas can alter the biology of these tumors, and that development of targeted STAT3 inhibitors would likely be of particular benefit in treatment of this disease.
Disciplines :
Genetics & genetic processes
Author, co-author :
Alvarez, James V.
Mukherjee, Neelanjan
Chakravarti, Arnab
Robe, Pierre ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département des sciences biomédicales et précliniques > Département des sciences biomédicales et précliniques
Zhai, Gary
Chakladar, Abhijit
Loeffler, Jay
Black, Peter
Frank, David A.
Language :
English
Title :
A STAT3 Gene Expression Signature in Gliomas is Associated with a Poor Prognosis.