BioProject

Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissues are a vast resource of annotated clinical samples. More...

Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissues are a vast resource of annotated clinical samples. As such, they represent highly desirable and informative materials for the application of high-definition genomics for improved patient management and to advance the development of personalized therapeutics. However, a limitation of FFPE tissues is the variable quality of DNA extracted for analyses. Furthermore, admixtures of non-tumor and polyclonal neoplastic cell populations limit the number of biopsies that can be studied and make it difficult to define cancer genomes in patient samples. To exploit these valuable tissues, we applied flow cytometry-based methods to isolate pure populations of tumor cell nuclei from FFPE tissues and developed a methodology compatible with oligonucleotide array CGH and whole exome sequencing analyses. These were used to profile a variety of tumors (breast, brain, bladder, ovarian and pancreas), including the genomes and exomes of matching fresh frozen and FFPE pancreatic adenocarcinoma samples. Overall design: A total of 23 test samples were each hybridized with a pooled 46,XX commercial reference (Promega catalog# G1521, Madison, WI). Twenty-two of the test samples included flow-sorted fresh frozen and formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tumor samples. The tissues included pancreatic adenocarcinomas, breast carcinomas, small cell carcinoma of the ovary, glioblastoma, and bladder carcinoma. The last test sample was a pancreatic adenocarcinoma cell line (A10-74). Less...