Comparative oncogenomics identifies tyrosine kinase FES as a tumor suppressor in melanoma
Michael Olvedy, Julie C. Tisserand, Flavie Luciani, Bram Boeckx, Jasper Wouters, Sophie Lopez, Florian Rambow, Sara Aibar, Bernard Thienpont, Jasmine Barra, Corinna Köhler, Enrico Radaelli, Sophie Tartare-Deckert, Stein Aerts, Patrice Dubreuil, Joost J. van den Oord, Diether Lambrechts, Paulo De Sepulveda, Jean-Christophe Marine
Michael Olvedy, Julie C. Tisserand, Flavie Luciani, Bram Boeckx, Jasper Wouters, Sophie Lopez, Florian Rambow, Sara Aibar, Bernard Thienpont, Jasmine Barra, Corinna Köhler, Enrico Radaelli, Sophie Tartare-Deckert, Stein Aerts, Patrice Dubreuil, Joost J. van den Oord, Diether Lambrechts, Paulo De Sepulveda, Jean-Christophe Marine
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Research Article Genetics Oncology

Comparative oncogenomics identifies tyrosine kinase FES as a tumor suppressor in melanoma

Abstract

Identification and functional validation of oncogenic drivers are essential steps toward advancing cancer precision medicine. Here, we have presented a comprehensive analysis of the somatic genomic landscape of the widely used BRAFV600E- and NRASQ61K-driven mouse models of melanoma. By integrating the data with publically available genomic, epigenomic, and transcriptomic information from human clinical samples, we confirmed the importance of several genes and pathways previously implicated in human melanoma, including the tumor-suppressor genes phosphatase and tensin homolog (PTEN), cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor 2A (CDKN2A), LKB1, and others. Importantly, this approach also identified additional putative melanoma drivers with prognostic and therapeutic relevance. Surprisingly, one of these genes encodes the tyrosine kinase FES. Whereas FES is highly expressed in normal human melanocytes, FES expression is strongly decreased in over 30% of human melanomas. This downregulation correlates with poor overall survival. Correspondingly, engineered deletion of Fes accelerated tumor progression in a BRAFV600E-driven mouse model of melanoma. Together, these data implicate FES as a driver of melanoma progression and demonstrate the potential of cross-species oncogenomic approaches combined with mouse modeling to uncover impactful mutations and oncogenic driver alleles with clinical importance in the treatment of human cancer.

Authors

Michael Olvedy, Julie C. Tisserand, Flavie Luciani, Bram Boeckx, Jasper Wouters, Sophie Lopez, Florian Rambow, Sara Aibar, Bernard Thienpont, Jasmine Barra, Corinna Köhler, Enrico Radaelli, Sophie Tartare-Deckert, Stein Aerts, Patrice Dubreuil, Joost J. van den Oord, Diether Lambrechts, Paulo De Sepulveda, Jean-Christophe Marine

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Figure 4

Low FES expression defines a subset of human melanoma with poor prognosis.

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Low FES expression defines a subset of human melanoma with poor prognosi...
(A) Representative pictures of FES staining in human cutaneous melanoma samples. Left panel shows FES staining in normal human skin; the inset shows a zoom-in view of a melanocyte residing in the basal layer of the epidermis. The three panels on the right show representative photographs of FES-positive and FES-negative melanoma cases. The photograph on the far right depicts the difference in the intensity of FES staining within melanoma. The epidermal layer (E) showed more intense staining compared with the dermal skin layer (D). Scale bars: 100 μm. (B) Kaplan-Meier curve of FES-positive versus FES-negative cases determined from FES staining on a tissue microarray containing 176 human metastatic melanoma samples. The survival time represents the time from the diagnosis of primary melanoma until the melanoma-related death of the patient. Statistical significance was determined by the Mantel-Cox test (α = 5.000%).