Expression of a specific extracellular matrix signature is a favorable prognostic factor in acute myeloid leukemia

Valerio Izzi; Juho Lakkala; Raman Devarajan; Eeva-Riitta Savolainen; Pirjo Koistinen; Ritva Heljasvaara; Taina Pihlajaniemi

doi:10.1016/j.lrr.2017.12.001

Expression of a specific extracellular matrix signature is a favorable prognostic factor in acute myeloid leukemia

Leuk Res Rep. 2017 Dec 13:9:9-13. doi: 10.1016/j.lrr.2017.12.001. eCollection 2018.

Authors

Valerio Izzi¹, Juho Lakkala¹, Raman Devarajan¹, Eeva-Riitta Savolainen², Pirjo Koistinen³, Ritva Heljasvaara^{1

4}, Taina Pihlajaniemi¹

Affiliations

¹ Centre of Excellence in Cell-Extracellular Matrix Research and Biocenter Oulu, Faculty of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland.
² Nordlab Oulu and Institute of Diagnostics, Department of Clinical Chemistry, Oulu University Hospital, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland.
³ Medical Research Center Oulu, Institute of Clinical Medicine, Oulu University Hospital, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland.
⁴ Centre for Cancer Biomarkers (CCBIO), Department of Biomedicine, University of Bergen, N-5009 Bergen, Norway.

Abstract

Relapse of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is still dramatically frequent, imposing the need for early markers to quantify such risk. Recent evidence point to a prominent role for extracellular matrix (ECM) in AML, but its prognostic value has not yet been investigated. Here we have investigated whether the expression of a 15-ECM gene signature could be applied to clinical AML research evaluating a retrospective cohort of 61 AML patients and 12 healthy donors. Results show that patients whose ECM signature expression is at least twice as that of healthy donors have considerably longer relapse-free survival, with further stage-specific therapy outcomes.

Keywords: Acute myeloid leukemia (AML); Clinical study; Extracellular matrix (ECM); Hematopoiesis; PCR.