ALBERT

Description: Bone marrow (BM) fibrosis is a key pathomorphologic feature of patients (pts) with primary myelofibrosis (PMF) and the fibrotic phases of essential thrombocythemia (post-ET MF) and polycythemia vera (post-PV MF). The degree of BM fibrosis appears to correlate with survival. Indeed worse survival has been associated with increased BM fibrosis. The BM stromal microenvironment is important in the pathogenesis of BM fibrosis. Cellular components (fibroblasts, macrophages, endothelial cells, adipocytes), structural fibrils (collagen, reticulin) and extracellular matrix components are all forming elements of the BM stroma. Increased stromal fibrosis has been linked to abnormalities in the number/ function of megakaryocytes and platelets in hematologic diseases. Several cytokines like Platelet Derived Growth Factor (PDGF) and Transforming Growth Factor-Beta (TGF-b) have been also linked to the pathophysiology of BM fibrosis. PDGF has been shown to increase fibroblast growth in megakaryocytes and platelets although increased PDGF did not correlate with increased production of either reticulin or collagenous fibrosis. Moreover, PMF pts have increased TGF-b levels in platelets, megakaryocytes, and monocytes. Nitric Oxide (NO) is a ubiquitous gas important in physiologic processes particularly vasodilatation. Dysregulation of NO levels has been implicated in pulmonary hypertension (PH), hemoglobinopathies, and cardiovascular diseases. In Peyronie’s disease, a localized fibrosis of the penile tunica albuginea, increased NO production by expression of iNOS decreases collagen deposition by neutralization of profibrotic reactive oxygen species and decreased myofibroblast formation. Aside from its role in maintaining normal vascular tone, NO also plays a role in fibroblast formation and collagen biosynthesis. We previously reported that ruxolitinib, a JAK1/2 inhibitor restores NO levels leading to improvement of PH in MF pts (Tabarroki et al., Leukemia 2014). We now hypothesize that plasma/serum NO level is a key regulator of BM fibrosis in MF and that ruxolitinib treatment (Tx) leads to improvement of BM fibrosis by NO modulation. Using a Sievers 280i NO analyzer we measured the plasma/serum NO level of a large cohort (n=75) of pts with myeloid and myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) [MDS, RARS/RCMD=8; MPN, ET=8, PV=8, MF=24, Mastocytosis=7; MDS/MPN, CMML=11, MDS/MPN-U, RARS-T=9]. Healthy subjects (n=10) were used as a control. MPN pts had low NO (nM) levels among the pts studied with the lowest level found in MF pts: MF=30.31±11.8, PV=39.0±16.1, ET=36±20.3, RARS=74.6±41.7 (P=.01), CMML=84.4±89.2 (P=.04), RCMD=163.4±103.8 (P

Description: Myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) are a heterogeneous group of blood cancers characterized by bone marrow (BM) failure, peripheral blood cytopenias, dysplasia, chromosomal abnormalities and an increased risk for transformation to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Patients (pts) with higher risk disease are primarily treated with pharmacologic treatments like hypomethylating therapy (HMT) (5-azacytidine and decitabine). 5-azacytidine (AZA) and decitabine (DAC) can result in overall response rates of 36% with a median duration of response of 15 months and 17-21% with a median duration of response of 10 months, respectively. Pts refractory to HMT have poor outcomes with a median overall survival of ∼4 months. Spliceosome gene mutations are frequently found in certain subtypes of MDS specifically SF3B1 (∼28%), U2AF1 (6-12%) and SRSF2 (6-12%). The prognostic value of spliceosome mutations in different MDS subtypes has been largely investigated while the impact of these mutations on treatment response is still unknown. We aim to investigate the frequency of three commonly mutated spliceosome genes (SF3B1, U2AF1, and SRSF2) in pts who failed HMT in order to define mutational frequency and evaluate the feasibility of targeted therapy with next generation spliceosome inhibitors. We screened a cohort of 120 pts (MDS, 70; MDS/MPN, 33; MDS/sAML, 17; median age: 69; male/female: 85/35) that underwent HMT (AZA: 58; DAC: 21; AZA/DAC: 7; AZA/REV: 25; DAC/REV: 4; AZA/DAC/REV: 5). Forty-eight percent of pts failed HMT therapy as refractory or relapse. We performed Sanger sequencing on BM/peripheral blood DNA for known pathways involved in MDS pathogenesis including methylation (TET2, DNMT3A, IDH1/2), histone (ASXL1, UTX, EZH2), signaling (CBL, N/KRAS), transcription (RUNX1, TP53, JAK2), and RNA splicing (SF3B1, U2AF1, SRSF2). Data analysis was available for 90 pts. We detected a total of 131 mutations in different pathways. In total, spliceosome mutations were observed in 28/90 (31%) of pts. When we analyzed the presence of the mutations in relation to the rate of response, we found that pts who failed HMT have frequent spliceosome mutations: 17/58 (29%). We have reported that molecular mutations in TET2 and DNMT3A can predict response to treatment to HMT (Traina F, Blood (ASH Annual Meeting Abstracts), Nov 2011; 118: 461). Indeed, the frequency of mutations in methylation genes was lower in the group of pts who failed HMT (11/58; 18.9%) compared to pts who achieved hematological response (11/32; 34%). Spliceosome inhibitors have been proposed for targetted therapy in MDS. The presence of spliceosome mutations in pts who failed HMT can open a new era of investigation leading to the possibility of using spliceosome inhibitors in pts who fail conventional therapy. We performed RNA-sequencing analysis on BM cells of pts who failed HMT compared to pts who achieved hematological response (n=2 vs 2) in order to define any specific gene signature explaining the differences in response to HMT. We performed differential gene expression testing on 11,459 expressed genes. In total, 158 genes were differentially expressed at FDR 〈 .2 in responders compared to not responders. We identified several interesting genes involved in tumorigenesis and epigenetic regulation such as YPEL3, and ST14, which were up-regulated in responders vs not responders (FC: 4 and 7.5; P

Description: Abstract 461 Aberrant DNA methylation is a hallmark of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), MDS/myeloproliferative neoplasms (MDS/MPN) and secondary acute myeloid leukemia (sAML). It provides a rationale for treating these malignancies with hypomethylating agents like 5-azacitidine (AZA) and decitabine (DAC). However, treatment outcomes remain limited and heavily weighed on morphologic/cytogenetic results. The discovery of novel mutations has provided important insight into the pathogenesis of MDS and related disorders. Genes implicated in epigenetic regulation, including DNMT3A, TET2, IDH1/IDH2, EZH2, ASXL1 and UTX have been found mutated in MDS, while others have also been implicated in MDS pathogenesis. There is limited data on the predictive value of these genetic defects for treatment response and disease outcome. We hypothesized that these defects are important biomarkers predictive of response to hypomethylating agents. We studied 88 patients with MDS (RCUD=2, RARS=6, RCMD=11, MDS-U=3, RAEB-1/2=29, CMML1/2=16, MDS/MPN-U=5, RARS-T=5, AML from MDS=11) who received hypomethylating agents (AZA=53, DAC=24, both=11). The median number of cycles was 7 [range 1–35], median age was 69 years (range 42–82) and median follow-up was 18 months (range 0–76). Responses were scored according to IWG criteria. DNMT3A, TET2, IDH1/2, EZH2, ASXL1, UTX, KRAS, NRAS, CBL, RUNX1, TP53 and SF3B1 were sequenced using standard techniques. Categorical variables were analyzed using Chi-square statistics. Overall survival (OS) was analyzed using Kaplan-Meier; p-values ≤ 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Mutated patients were older than wild type (WT) cases (72 vs. 68 years, p=.01) but were well matched for marrow blast %, cytogenetic risk group and cycles of hypomethylating agents received. We found mutations in 40/88 (45%) patients. Mutations were most frequent in SF3B1 (6/11; 55%), ASXL1 (13/50; 26%), TET2 (18/88; 20%), KRAS (3/34; 9%), and DNMT3A (7/88; 8%). Less common were mutations in EZH2 (2/43; 5%), TP53 (1/23; 4%), IDH1 (4/88; 5%), IDH2 (3/88; 3%), and UTX (1/36;3%). No mutations were found in CBL, NRAS or RUNX1. Based on single mutations, overall response rate (ORR) was higher in mutated vs WT patients for DNMT3A (6/7 [86%] vs 33/81 [41%]; p=.02), ASXL1 (11/13 [85%] vs 14/37 [38%]; p=.003), and TET2 (12/18 [67%] vs. 27/70 [39%]; p=.03). All heterozygous DNMT3A mutants responded to hypomethylating agents. Differences remained significant when stratified to AZA treatment alone for DNMT3A (6/7 [86%] vs 21/56 [38%]; p=.01) and ASXL1 (9/11 [82%] vs 12/29 [41%]; p=.02) but not TET2 (6/10 [60%] vs 21/53 [40%]; p=0.22). The predictive value of combined mutations were analyzed for DNMT3A, TET2 and/or IDH1/2, showing better response to hypomethylating therapy in patients who had a mutation; ORR (mutated: 18/28 (64%) vs WT: 21/60 (35%); p=.01). This difference remained significant in patients receiving only AZA (n=53); ORR was 11/18 (61%) in mutant and 11/35 (31%) in WT patients (p=.03). No differences in ORR were noted for KRAS, EZH2 and IDH1/2 mutant and WT patients. No SF3B1 mutants responded to treatment while both patients with UTX and TP53 mutations responded. The frequency of AML evolution was also analyzed and showed no difference between mutant and WT cases for TET2 (7/18 [39%] vs 22/70 [31%];p=.52), ASXL1 (4/10 [40%] vs 11/35 [31%]; p=.61), and DNMT3A (3/7 [43%] vs 26/81 [32%];p=.56). No differences in OS and progression free survival (PFS) were noted between responders and non-responders to hypomethylating therapy (28 vs 17 mos, p=.25; 16 vs 8 mos, p=.54). Comparison of survival outcomes for mutant and WT patients showed no significant difference for DNMT3A (OS: 30 vs 21 mos, p=0.43; PFS: 20 vs 11, p=.53), ASXL1 (OS: 28 vs 22, p=.68; PFS: 16 vs 10, p=.88), and TET2 (OS: 30 vs 20 mos, p=.30). PFS was better in TET2 mutants compared to WT (19 vs 9, p=.03). No survival differences were noted between mutant and WT cases who responded to hypomethylating agents for DNMT3A (OS: 25 vs 28,p=.84; PFS: 14 vs 16, p=.78), ASXL1 (OS: 10 vs 18, p=.48; PFS: 10 vs 6, p=.76) TET2 (OS: 27 vs 16, p=.79; PFS: 18 vs10, p=.19). In conclusion, DNMT3A, ASXL1 and TET2 mutations were independently associated with a better response to hypomethylating drugs. Moreover, combined mutations in DNMT3A/TET2/IDH1/IDH2 may influence the response to hypomethylating agents, especially AZA supporting its role as a predictive biomarker in MDS treatment. Disclosures: Maciejewski: Celgene and Eisai, NIH, AA&MDS Foundation: Research Funding. Tiu:MDS Foundation Young Investigator Award: Research Funding.

Description: Abstract 2795 Interstitial deletions of chromosome 5q are common in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), pointing towards the pathogenic role of this region in disease phenotype and clonal evolution. The higher level of resolution of single nucleotide polymorphism array (SNP-A) karyotyping may be used to find cryptic abnormalities, and to precisely define the topographic features of the genomic lesions allowing for more accurate clinical correlations. In order to better address the genetic and genomic complexity of 5q abnormalities in myeloid malignances, we analyzed a large series of 1,155 clinically well-annotated patients with malignant myeloid disorders with SNP-A-based karyotyping to define: i) the extent of the 5q deletion, investigating whether loss of genes is different among 5q disorders; ii) minimally deleted region(s); iii) associated non-5q genomic lesions with 5q abnormalities; and iv) the association of genomic abnormalities with clinical features. We identified chromosome 5q deletions in 142/1155 patients (12%) and uniparental disomy segments (UPD) in 4/1155 patients (0.35%). With increased resolution there was a shift towards more complex karyotypes and increased identification of additional lesions among the patients with 5q aberrations. By SNP-A, previously cryptic lesions were identified in 52% of the patients who otherwise showed a singular del(5q) lesion by metaphase cytogenetics (MC). The presence of chromosome 5q material in all our cases with apparent monosomy 5 (N=11) by conventional MC serves as an illustration for SNP array-based mapping allowing for a more precise definition of the breakpoints; in addition, 48% of MC results localized both the beginning and end of the deletion to a different band than SNP-A, and in only 9% of cases, MC and SNP-A boundaries coincided. The CDR defined in our 5q-syndrome, though with wider limits (145,279,940–153,809,148), encompasses the CDR described by Boultwood et al; the CDR in advanced del(5q) MDS and AML patients is centered on a sub-section of bands 5q31.2 and 5q31.3 (137,528,564–139,451,907) and includes the defect initially mapped by Le Beau et al. Patients with MDS and deletions involving the centromeric and telomeric extremes of 5q have a more aggressive disease phenotype (median overall survival: 32 months, p=0.04, HR 1.9; median number of chromosome lesions: 5.8 vs. 1.1, p

Description: Isochromosome 17q [i(17q)], a poor prognostic cytogenetic abnormality is a product of the breakage or inappropriate division of the pericentromere leading to the duplication of the long and loss of the short arm of chromosome 17. The region of the breakpoints maps at 17p11, a region encompassing a key tumor suppressor gene: TP53. I(17q) are detected in myelodysplastic/ myeloproliferative neoplasms (MDS/ MPN), chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), and acute myeloid leukemia (AML). This abnormality can occur as a sole structural abnormality or in combination with other chromosomal defects. The presence of i(17q) is associated with poor therapeutic response, disease progression, and an unfavorable clinical outcome. Elucidation of the molecular architecture of patients (pts) carrying i(17q) may lead to better understanding of disease biology and development of novel compounds that can target this disease. We selected 11 pts with i(17q) to characterize their genomic differences. We applied whole exome sequencing (WES) in order to define latent molecular defects explaining the clinical phenotype of this disease. The index case was a male MDS/MPN pt with isolated i(17q), 27% RS, hypercellular bone marrow (BM), mild splenomegaly, and atypical megakaryocytes. The pt developed 7% BM blasts without clinical response to growth factors. Molecularly this pt was a wild type SF3B1, a gene frequently mutated in RARS-T and associated with lower transformation rate to leukemia, better survival, and good/intermediate risk cytogenetic abnormalities. WES was performed on 2 ug of total DNA extracted from BM cells. Non-clonal CD3+ cells were used as source of germ-line control. Twenty-millions reads were run on an Illumina HiSeq2000 sequencer. Using a stringent bio-informatic algorithm developed in house, all variants were filtered based on a variation score (〉=30) and a coverage (30X) and the tumor nucleotide variation analysis was performed for each pair (tumor vs. germ-line), where only the variants unique to the tumor were retained. Variants were ultimately filtered in order to exclude SNPs by an in-house annotation and importing the hg19 SNP135. We detected 65 unique candidate genes. Four genes were confirmed to be somatic: 3 were novel: ZFP42 (4q35.2), P4HTM (3p21.31), and VPRBP (3p21.2) and 1 includes the newly discovered SETBP1 (18q12.3) gene. Three variants detected on the chromosome 17 had a wild type configuration. The subsequently genotyped all the pts (MDS/MPN/-U 3; AML 4; RCMD 1; CML 1; RAEB-1 2; mean age: 68 years; male/female: 8/3; i(17q)/other abnormalities:3/8) for the above genes and for a panel of genes known to be mutated in MDS/MPN and other diseases in order to find any genetic association explaining the disase phenotype. We applied Sanger sequencing to DNA derived from BM/peripheral blood cells (BM/PB:7/4) for the following genes and respective exons: TP53 (all exons), SF3B1 (13-16), SRSF2 (1-2), U2AF1 (2 and 6), TET2 (all exons), DNMT3A (18-23), IDH1/2 (4), CBL (8-9), N/KRAS (1-2), ASXL1 (12), JAK2 (12 and 14), EZH2 (16, 18 and 19), MPL (exon 10), BCAS3 (12, 15 and 16), FLT3 (11 and 17), and CSF3R (13,14, and 17). In total, we found 16 heterozygous missense mutations and 1 tandem duplication. We found somatic mutations in ZFP42, P4HTM, and VPRBP in 1 pt. The index case reported a mutation in SETBP1 and SRSF2. SF3B1 was detected as a sole abnormality in 1 patient. Of note, the patient with SF3B1 mutation (K700E) had 50% RS and achieved a complete hematologic remission after decitabine therapy. The most frequent mutations were found in SETBP1 and SRSF2. SETBP1 was found to be mutated in 4/11 (36.3%) pts (D868N, I871T, and G870S was common in 2 pts) while SRSF2 mutations (P95H/R) were found in 3/11 (27.2%) pts. Three pts showed concomitant SRSF2 and SETBP1 mutations. NRAS (G12D) was mutated in 1 pt and associated with SRSF2 and SETBP1 mutations. One pt showed mutations in TET2, JAK2, and TP53. Of note, this pt did not respond to treatment. One pt with MDS/MPN showed a mutation in CSF3R (Q741X), a novel gene discovered in chronic neutrophilic leukemia and atypical CML. The pt also has monosomy 7 and i(17q) abnormality. FLT3-ITD was found in 1 pt. As of last follow-up, only 2 pts remain alive. In sum, we found that poor risk molecular mutations in SRSF2 and SETBP1 are frequently found in i(17q) myeloid malignancies and may be the drivers of poor outcomes in this disease. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.

Description: Cytogenetics is the most important predictor of outcomes in AML. Traditional metaphase cytogenetics (MC), can detect abnormalities in only 40–60% of AML patients. Whole genome scanning by single nucleotide polymorphism arrays (SNP-A) can identify somatic chromosomal changes in hematopoietic malignancies and, due to its superb resolution, may detect previously cryptic unbalanced defects, even in samples deemed “normal” or uninformative using MC. Through simultaneous detection of loss of heterozygosity (LOH) and gene copy number changes, SNP-A also facilitate the identification of somatic segmental uniparental disomy (UPD). Here we tested whether SNP-A analysis could improve the detection rate of chromosomal defects in AML and enhances the prognostic value of MC. Analyses were performed using 250K and/or 6.0 Affymetrix SNP arrays on 140 primary (p) and secondary AML (sAML) patients (newly diagnosed= 107, relapsed=15, remission= 12, persistent=6) and 116 healthy controls. Data on cytogenetic detection rate, complete remission (CR), overall survival [OS], relapse free survival [RFS], remission duration [RD], and event free survival [EFS]) rates were obtained from patients who received induction chemotherapy. We also performed Flt-3 ITD, Flt-3 TKD and NPM-1 mutation analysis and integrated the clinical outcomes with SNP-A results. For patients in whom new defects were detected, germ-line DNA was also analyzed whenever technically possible. The cytogenetic abnormality detection rate in patients with active disease was higher with SNP-A compared to MC (pAML, 75% vs 43% p=

Description: The WHO classification recognizes chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML) as an overlap syndrome sharing clinical and histomorphologic features with both MDS and MPD. Unlike in CML or classical MPD, which are often characterized by recurrent translocations or activating mutations, only 1/3 of CMML patients harbor lesions (e.g. balanced translocations that include PDGFb as a fusion partner). Also frequent are unbalanced aberrations similar to those seen in classical MDS. Of note is that IPSS assigns prognosis only to a portion of patients with CMML (those with 〉10% of blasts and/or high WBC counts). Since chromosomal defects have a major impact on the diagnosis and prognosis of myeloid malignancies, it is likely that cytogenetic methods with higher resolution and an ability to detect uniparental disomy (UPD) could explain clinical heterogeneity and point to potential therapeutic targets in CMML. We applied 250K SNP-arrays (SNP-A) to examine karyotype and identify previously cryptic defects in patients with low grade and advanced forms of CMML. SNP-A allows for detection of clones spanning 25–50% of total cell population, and fidelity of LOH calls is 〉99% as shown by analysis of chromosome (chr.) X in males. Any deletions, duplications, and/or UPD found by SNP-A in 76 controls or those on internet databases were considered copy number variants (CNV) and excluded from analysis. In total, we studied 77 patients with CMML; 42/77 showed abnormal MC, including most often lesions commonly associated with MDS/CMML, such as +8 (N=5) and +19 (N=2). DNA was available for SNP-A karyotyping in 46 patients. Abnormal karyotype was detected in 19/46 patients (40%) by MC compared to 37/46 patients (79%) by SNP-A. Examples of newly detected lesions included microdeletions of chrs. 12 and 7, and various micro-duplications/deletions. Remarkably, we found (perhaps in analogy to UPD9p seen in MPD) a high prevalence of segmental UPD, occurring in 20/47 patients (43%) with significant recurrence on chrs. 4 (N=4), 6 (N=4), and 11 (N=4). 7/20 patients had UPD as a sole or isolated abnormality. In 3 these patients, UPD11q was the sole contributing lesion while in one patient with UPD11, only one additional lesion, a small microdeletion of chr. 3, was found. Of note is that previously we have found also UPD11q in 4/29 patients with MDS/MPD-U. When we analyzed SNP-A results in CMML patients according to blast counts (CMML-1/2) and WBC (myeloproliferative type (MP) vs. myelodysplastic type (MD)), CMML-2 patients showed a higher frequency/more complex lesions, likely acquired in the process of transformation (1.5 vs. 2.2 avg. lesions). In addition to identifying abnormal overlapping/recurrent aberrations, SNP-A karyotyping has a potential clinical utility. When we stratified patients according to SNP-A detected lesions, we found a statistically significant difference between overall survival of patients with normal MC and normal SNP-A vs. those with normal MC but abnormal SNP-A (p=0.03, 40.2 vs. 7.3 months). In summary, SNP-A-based karyotyping complements MC and allows for precise definition of chr. aberrations in patients with CMML, including copy-neutral LOH. UPD is common in CMML and overlapping regions may point to potential causative genes.

Description: Areas of loss of heterozygosity (LOH) can be precisely delineated using single nucleotide polymorphism arrays (SNP-A) allowing for detection of submicroscopic chromosomal defects and segmental somatic uniparental disomy (UPD) not revealed by metaphase cytogenetic analysis (MC). This study focused on aberration of chromosome 17. We analyzed marrow specimens in 1162 MDS/AML by MC and found 39 patients whose karyotype involved monosomy 17. All had a complex karyotype, aggressive histomorphologic features (1/39 low risk, 26/39 advanced MDS/sAML, 2/39 MDS/MPD, and 10/39 pAML) with a median survival of 3 months. In addition to loss of chromosome 17, 35/39 patients also showed either −5/del(5q) (N=10), −7/del(7q) (N=2), or both (N=23). To better delineate the boundaries of LOH on 17th chromosome, we analyzed a subset of 532 patients by SNP-A and identified 43/532 samples with an abnormal chromosome 17; 28 had interstitial deletions and 15 had somatic UPD. In 17/19 samples with monosomy 17 by MC, SNP-A revealed a deletion in 17p or 17q, indicating incomplete loss of chromosome 17 material. SNP-A yielded a total of 11 additional lesions on 17q not detected by MC. We were able to define two commonly deleted regions (CDR1 and CDR2). CDR1 (bp 6,828,482 to 8,075,871; 1.25 Mb) encompassed around 90 genes, including TP53, and was present in 11/14 samples with del17p. CDR2 (bp 25,320,435 to 27,355,332; 2Mb) was detected in 7/14 patients and encompassed approximately 33 genes, including NF1. Overall, the frequency of UPD17 was high: 17p UPD was detected in 7 and 17q in 8 samples analyzed. In all cases with 17p UPD, the region of UPD overlapped with CDR1. CDR2 overlapped with the region of 17q UPD in 4/8 samples. In analogy to monosomy 17, 18/21patients with LOH 17p (7 UPD, 14 losses) had a complex karyotype, 21/21 had aggressive histomorphologic features (1/21 RCMD, 3/21 RCMD-RS, 6/21 RAEB-1/2, 3/21 pAML, 8/21sAML) and a poor prognosis with a median survival of 2.6 months. Moreover, in 13/14 patients with del(17p) by SNP-A, −5/del(5q) (N=1) or both −5/del(5q) and −7/del(7q) (N=12) were present. One patient did not show deletions of chromosomes 5 or 7, but had del (4)(q26) and del(6)(q23.2). No patient had del(17p) as the sole abnormality. Strong association between 17p UPD and abnormalities of chromosomes 5 and/or 7 was also noted: of 7 patients with 17p UPD, 3 had 5/del(5q), 1 showed −7/del(7q), and 3 had −5/del(5q) and −7/del(7q). We hypothesized that LOH within the 17p CDR1 that includes TP53 might be associated with a distinct clinical phenotype and point toward pathogenic TP53 mutations. Overall, 18 instances of 17p LOH included the TP53 locus. When TP53 exons 5–9 were screened for mutations in patients with 17p LOH, we found biallelic TP53 mutations in 5/6 patients with somatic 17p UPD and in 6/8 patients with 17p deletions. We detected 10 missense mutations and 1 insertion. All missense mutations were located in the DNA-binding domain of TP53 (4/10 in exon 5: C141Y, V172F, C176Y, H179Q; 2/10 exon 6: H193N, H193R; 1/10 exon 7: R249G and 3/10 exon 8: V272L, V272M, R273H). Our study demonstrates that LOH of 17p in myeloid malignancies should prompt consideration of TP53 mutation. TP53 mutation is linked with an aggressive clinical phenotype and is highly associated with partial or complete loss of chromosomes 5 and/or 7. To our knowledge this is the first report of biallelic TP53 mutations due to UPD17p in myeloid malignancies, and indicates that both heterozygous and homozygous mutations can be encountered and comprise part of the pathologic continuum of the selection process of malignant myeloid clones.

Description: Abstract 3374 Metaphase spreads have an established value in the routine diagnostic workup of myeloid malignancies and bone marrow failure disorders. In myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) abnormal karyotypes play a large role in scoring systems and may greatly impact prognosis, or even predict responsiveness to certain therapies. In aplastic anemia (AA) cytogenetic abnormalities detected by metaphase karyotyping may rule out hypoplastic MDS. In myeloproliferative neoplasia (MPN), an abnormal karyotype may distinguish between reactive or malignant proliferation. Due to technical problems, including specimen quality, viability, hypocellularity or a failure of growth, this routine test may fail to yield conclusive results in some patients. With the advent of SNP-A karyotyping, which only requires extracted DNA, non-informative cases can be resolved. As a cytogenetic test, single nucleotide polymorphism array (SNP-A) analysis can provide an opportunity to improve risk assessment and selection of proper treatment modalities. The advantages of SNP-A include excellent resolution, detection of copy neutral loss of heterozygosity (also known as uniparental disomy or UPD), and perhaps most importantly, the ability to test archived DNA samples, rather than actively dividing cells. However, unlike metaphase cytogenetics, this technology cannot detect subsets of abnormal populations or certain classes of genomic rearrangements, such as balanced translocation, inversion or ring chromosomes. In this study, we examined the prognosis and disease characterization for patients with non-informative cytogenetics (N=144) collected over the last 8 years. SNP-A-based karyotyping has been performed for a representative subset of these patients (N=60) to assess whether this technique could provide clinically relevant information. These patients included patients with MDS (N=20), AA (N=20), AML (N=12) and MDS/MPN (N=3). Bone marrow obtained following induction chemotherapy was excluded. We have detected 27 somatic microdeletions and 33 microduplications (25Mb) in 2 cases, including 22q11.23qter and 14q12-q22.1. In 4/60 (7%) a complex karyotype was detected, while 10 had sole lesions (〉10Mb). In presumed AA patients, we have identified 2 patients with monosomy 7, prompting a change of diagnosis to MDS and thereby altering their clinical management. In MDS, when cytogenetic prognostic groupings were applied in previously unscored patients, 10/20 had IPSS scores of 3 or greater. The presence of chromosomal abnormalities detected by SNP-At indictated the presence of advanced risk disease and thereby contributed into poorer survival as predicted by IPSS. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.