A machine learning approach to integrate big data for precision medicine in acute myeloid leukemia

Nat Commun. 2018 Jan 3;9(1):42. doi: 10.1038/s41467-017-02465-5.

Abstract

Cancers that appear pathologically similar often respond differently to the same drug regimens. Methods to better match patients to drugs are in high demand. We demonstrate a promising approach to identify robust molecular markers for targeted treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) by introducing: data from 30 AML patients including genome-wide gene expression profiles and in vitro sensitivity to 160 chemotherapy drugs, a computational method to identify reliable gene expression markers for drug sensitivity by incorporating multi-omic prior information relevant to each gene's potential to drive cancer. We show that our method outperforms several state-of-the-art approaches in identifying molecular markers replicated in validation data and predicting drug sensitivity accurately. Finally, we identify SMARCA4 as a marker and driver of sensitivity to topoisomerase II inhibitors, mitoxantrone, and etoposide, in AML by showing that cell lines transduced to have high SMARCA4 expression reveal dramatically increased sensitivity to these agents.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms
  • Antineoplastic Agents / pharmacology
  • Antineoplastic Agents / therapeutic use
  • Biomarkers, Tumor / metabolism
  • Cell Line
  • DNA Helicases / genetics*
  • Datasets as Topic
  • Drug Resistance, Neoplasm / genetics*
  • Etoposide / pharmacology
  • Etoposide / therapeutic use
  • Humans
  • Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute / drug therapy
  • Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute / genetics*
  • Machine Learning*
  • Nuclear Proteins / genetics*
  • Precision Medicine / methods*
  • Topoisomerase II Inhibitors / pharmacology
  • Topoisomerase II Inhibitors / therapeutic use
  • Transcription Factors / genetics*

Substances

  • Antineoplastic Agents
  • Biomarkers, Tumor
  • Nuclear Proteins
  • Topoisomerase II Inhibitors
  • Transcription Factors
  • Etoposide
  • SMARCA4 protein, human
  • DNA Helicases