P13.10 Glioblastoma within the subventricular zone associates with increased mesenchymal transition: an intratumoral gene expression analysis. (6th September 2019) - Berendsen, S
Abstract: BACKGROUND: Involvement of the subventricular zone (SVZ) in GBM is associated with poor prognosis and suggested to associate with specific tumor-biological characteristics. The SVZ microenvironment can influence gene expression and migration in GBM cells in preclinical models. We aimed to investigate whether the SVZ microenvironment has any influence on intratumoral gene expression patterns in GBM patients. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The publicly available Ivy GBM database contains clinical, radiological and whole exome sequencing data from multiple regions from en bloc resected GBMs. SVZ involvement of the various tissue samples was evaluated on MRI scans. In the tumors that contacted the SVZ, we performed gene expression analyses and gene set enrichment analyses to compare gene (set) expression in tumor regions within the SVZ to tumor regions outside the SVZ, within the same tumors. We also compared these samples to GBMs that made no contact with the SVZ. RESULTS: Within GBMs that contacted the SVZ, tissue samples within the SVZ showed enrichment of gene sets involved in (epithelial-)mesenchymal transition, NF-κB and STAT3 signaling, angiogenesis and hypoxia, compared to the samples outside of the SVZ region from the same tumors (p<0.05, FDR<0.25). Comparison of GBM samples within the SVZ region to samples from tumors that did not contact the SVZ yielded similar results. In contrast, we observed no difference in gene set enrichment when comparing the samples outside of the SVZ from SVZ-contacting GBMs with samples from GBMs that did not contact the SVZ at all. CONCLUSION: GBM samples in the SVZ region associate with increased (epithelial-)mesenchymal transition and angiogenesis/hypoxia signaling, possibly mediated by the SVZ microenvironment.