Overview of research on fusion genes in prostate cancer

Chunjiao Song; Huan Chen

doi:10.21037/tcr.2020.01.34

Overview of research on fusion genes in prostate cancer

Transl Cancer Res. 2020 Mar;9(3):1998-2011. doi: 10.21037/tcr.2020.01.34.

Authors

Chunjiao Song^{1

2}, Huan Chen³

Affiliations

¹ Medical Research Center, Shaoxing People's Hospital, Shaoxing University School of Medicine, Shaoxing 312000, China.
² Shaoxing Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Shaoxing 312000, China.
³ Key Laboratory of Microorganism Technology and Bioinformatics Research of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Institute of Microbiology, Hangzhou 310000, China.

Abstract

Fusion genes are known to drive and promote carcinogenesis and cancer progression. In recent years, the rapid development of biotechnologies has led to the discovery of a large number of fusion genes in prostate cancer specimens. To further investigate them, we summarized the fusion genes. We searched related articles in PubMed, CNKI (Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure) and other databases, and the data of 92 literatures were summarized after preliminary screening. In this review, we summarized approximated 400 fusion genes since the first specific fusion TMPRSS2-ERG was discovered in prostate cancer in 2005. Some of these are prostate cancer specific, some are high-frequency in the prostate cancer of a certain ethnic group. This is a summary of scientific research in related fields and suggests that some fusion genes may become biomarkers or the targets for individualized therapies.

Keywords: Prostate cancer; biomarker; fusion gene.

Publication types

Review