Publication Date:
2014-08-01
Description:
Identifying somatic mutations is critical for cancer genome characterization and for prioritizing patient treatment. DNA whole exome sequencing (DNA-WES) is currently the most popular technology; however, this yields low sensitivity in low purity tumors. RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) covers the expressed exome with depth proportional to expression. We hypothesized that integrating DNA-WES and RNA-seq would enable superior mutation detection versus DNA-WES alone. We developed a first-of-its-kind method, called UNCeqR , that detects somatic mutations by integrating patient-matched RNA-seq and DNA-WES. In simulation, the integrated DNA and RNA model outperformed the DNA-WES only model. Validation by patient-matched whole genome sequencing demonstrated superior performance of the integrated model over DNA-WES only models, including a published method and published mutation profiles. Genome-wide mutational analysis of breast and lung cancer cohorts ( n = 871) revealed remarkable tumor genomics properties. Low purity tumors experienced the largest gains in mutation detection by integrating RNA-seq and DNA-WES. RNA provided greater mutation signal than DNA in expressed mutations. Compared to earlier studies on this cohort, UNCeqR increased mutation rates of driver and therapeutically targeted genes (e.g. PIK3CA , ERBB2 and FGFR2 ). In summary, integrating RNA-seq with DNA-WES increases mutation detection performance, especially for low purity tumors.
Keywords:
Polymorphism/mutation detection
Print ISSN:
0305-1048
Electronic ISSN:
1362-4962
Topics:
Biology
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