The US Food and Drug Administration approved a liquid biopsy test for EGFR-activating mutations in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer as a companion diagnostic for therapy selection. ctDNA also allows for the identification of mutations selected by treatment such as EGFR T790M in non-small-cell lung cancer. ctDNA can also detect mutations such as KRASG12V in colorectal cancer and BRAF V600E/V600K in melanoma.
In fact, the discordant pattern of BRAF and KRAS ctDNA was significantly correlated with the clinical response of melanoma to pembrolizumab treatment and progression of colorectal cancer noted by PET and/or CT scan.
KRAS, NRAS and BRAF mutations are among the most important oncogenic drivers in many major cancer types, such as melanoma, lung, colorectal and pancreatic cancer.
Collectively, these results revealed that miR-326 serves as a tumour suppressor in melanoma by targeting KRAS and regulating the AKT and ERK signalling pathways, indicating that miR-326 may be a promising therapeutic target for melanoma patients.
The rarity of HRAS and KRASQ61R mutants in malignant melanoma let previous investigations erroneously conclude that SP174 is specific for NRAS Q61R-mutant protein.
The US FDA approved a liquid biopsy test for EGFR activating mutations in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) as a companion diagnostic for therapy selection. ctDNA also allows for the identification of mutations selected by treatment such as EGFR T790M in NSCLC. ctDNA can also detect mutations such as KRASG12V in colorectal cancer and BRAF V600E/V600K in melanoma.
Treatment with ST-162 produced regression of mutant KRAS- or BRAF-addicted xenograft models of colorectal cancer and melanoma and stasis of BRAF/PTEN-mutant melanomas.
Oncogenic KRAS contributes to malignant transformation, antiapoptosis, and metastasis in multiple human cancers, such as lung, colon, and pancreatic cancers and melanoma.
The success of adoptive transfer of TCR-engineered T cells against melanoma and other cancers supports clinical trials with these T cells that recognize mutated KRAS in patients with a variety of common cancer types.
Since hypoxic microenvironments select for tumor cells with diminished therapeutic response, we investigated whether hypoxia unequally increases resistance to 3-BrPA in wt p53 MelJuso melanoma harbouring (Q61L)-mutant NRAS and wt BRAF, C8161 melanoma with (G12D)-mutant KRAS (G464E)-mutant BRAF, and A549 lung carcinoma with a KRAS (G12S)-mutation.
Furthermore, the combination of pan-RAF and MEK inhibitors displayed strong synergy in melanoma and colorectal cancer cell lines with RAS-activating events such as RTK activation, KRAS mutation, or NF1 loss-of-function mutations.
The clinically relevant genetic aberrations described in this review include mutation analyses of RAS (KRAS and NRAS), BRAF and PI3K in colorectal cancer, KIT or PDGFR alpha as well as BRAF, NRAS and KIT in malignant melanoma.
In addition, we discovered that the KRAS-variant was enriched in non-acral melanoma (25%), and that miR-137 under expression was significantly associated with melanomas with the KRAS-variant.
PIK3CA mutations were most frequent in squamous cervical (5/14, 36%), uterine (7/28, 25%), breast (6/29, 21%), and colorectal cancers (18/105, 17%); KRAS in pancreatic (5/9, 56%), colorectal (49/97, 51%), and uterine cancers (3/20, 15%); NRAS in melanoma (12/40, 30%), and uterine cancer (2/11, 18%); BRAF in melanoma (23/52, 44%), and colorectal cancer (5/88, 6%).
Activating mutations in KRAS and BRAF are found in more than 30% of all human tumours and 40% of melanoma, respectively, thus targeting this pathway could have broad therapeutic effects.
Mice harboring melanocyte-specific activated K-Ras and loss of p16(INK4a) and/or p53 developed invasive, unpigmented and nonmetastatic melanomas with short latency and high penetrance.
The frequency of KRAS mutations in the melanocytic aggregate (five of 18, 28%) was second to BRAF V600E, while in melanoma, the frequency was also second to BRAF V600E but equalled that of NRAS2 (1 of 18, 6%).No NRAS1 mutations were observed.
We have investigated 37 sporadic malignant melanomas (15 primary cutaneous melanomas and 22 melanoma metastases) and 6 melanoma cell lines for mutations in the 3 Ras genes NRAS, KRAS and HRAS.
To investigate whether these mutations occur in early or late tumor progression phases, we searched for point mutations in the N- and K-ras genes in 69 primary cutaneous melanoma, 35 metastases, and seven nevocellular nevi in association with cutaneous melanoma.