Abstract 1351: Alternative splicing of neurofibromin 1 is associated with elevated MAPK activity and poor prognosis in glioma

Abstract

Abstract High-grade gliomas (HGG) are invasive with poor prognosis regardless of age: diffuse intrinsic pontine gliomas (DIPG), arising in the brainstem, are almost universally fatal and the leading cause of brain-tumor death in children; while adult anaplastic astrocytoma and glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) have median survivals of 1-3 years. The mutational spectra of adult and pediatric HGG differ, with pediatric tumours containing recurrent mutations of H3F3A and HIST1H3B. However, alterations leading to RAS/MAPK/PI3K pathway activation, including PDGFRA amplification, EGFRvIII, BRAF-V600E, NF1 deletion, are frequently found, although not all tumours will have mutations in this pathway. The neurofibromin 1 (NF1) gene negatively regulates RAS signalling by stimulating RAS-GTP turnover, thereby leading to RAS-inactivation. The two major isoforms, NF1-I and NF1-II, differ only by inclusion of the 21 aa exon23a in the GAP-related domain of NF1-II. Exon23a-inclusion has been shown to render NF1 10 times less active towards RAS, leading to elevated MAPK signalling. The brain expresses predominantly NF1-I, while the major isoform elsewhere is NF1-II. Here we used RNA-Seq to identify genes alternatively spliced between DIPG and normal brain, identifying an isoform switch from NF1-I in normal brain to NF1-II; we additionally found the same isoform switch in the TCGA adult GBM and LGG cohorts. For both GBM and LGG, RAS/MAPK/PI3K wild-type tumors with elevated NF1-II conferred significantly reduced patient survival compared to RAS/MAPK/PI3K mutant tumors. NF1-exon23a inclusion is known to be repressed in cell model systems by the CELF and ELAV-like families of splice regulators. We further show that members of these gene families are downregulated in HGG. Together, our results indicate a novel mechanism by which gliomas can activate signaling downstream from RAS independent of mutations and tumor grade, which promotes tumorigenesis by regulating pathways such as proliferation and invasion. Citation Format: Robert Siddaway, Arun Ramani, Man Yu, Michael Brudno, Cynthia Hawkins. Alternative splicing of neurofibromin 1 is associated with elevated MAPK activity and poor prognosis in glioma [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2017; 2017 Apr 1-5; Washington, DC. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2017;77(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 1351. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2017-1351