Abstract
Colorectal cancer develops and progresses from genetic and genomic changes that occur within and transforms the growth behavior of a normal colonic cell. Molecular tools have advanced enough to allow the scientific community to probe deeper into risk alleles within a population as well as into individual patient genetic data that can ascribe such a risk. Detected genetic and genomic changes from colorectal cancer can help determine a patient’s prognosis, predict response to chemotherapy, and determine the approach to care with biological therapies. Utilizing stool, blood/plasma, and tumor tissue to obtain genetic, genomic, and pharmacokinetic information contribute to a person’s profile to direct specific cancer care.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Vogelstein B, Fearon ER, Hamilton SR, Kern SE, Preisinger AC, Leppert M, Nakamura Y, White R, Smits AM, Bos JL. Genetic alterations during colorectal-tumor development. N Engl J Med. 1988;319:525–32.
Vogelstein B, Fearon ER, Kern SE, Hamilton SR, Preisinger AC, Nakamura Y, White R. Allelotype of colorectal carcinomas. Science. 1989;244:207–11.
Lichtenstein P, Holm NV, Verkasalo PK, Iliadou A, Kaprio J, Koskenvuo M, Pukkala E, Skytthe A, Hemminki K. Environmental and heritable factors in the causation of cancer—analyses of cohorts of twins from Sweden, Denmark, and Finland. N Engl J Med. 2000;343:78–85.
Grady WM, Carethers JM. Genomic and epigenetic instability in colorectal cancer pathogenesis. Gastroenterology. 2008;135:1079–99.
Boland CR, Sinicrope FA, Brenner DE, Carethers JM. Colorectal cancer prevention and treatment. Gastroenterology. 2000;118:S115–28.
Carethers JM, Smith EJ, Behling CA, Nguyen L, Tajima A, Doctolero RT, Cabrera BL, Goel A, Arnold CA, Miyai K, Boland CR. Use of 5-fluorouracil and survival in patients with microsatellite unstable colorectal cancer. Gastroenterology. 2004;126: 394–401.
Carethers JM. Systemic treatment of advanced colorectal cancer: tailoring therapy to the tumor. Therap Adv Gastroenterol. 2008;1:33–42.
Carethers JM, Hawn MT, Chauhan DP, Luce MC, Marra G, Koi M, Boland CR. Competency in mismatch repair prohibits clonal expansion of cancer cells treated with N-methyl-N′-nitro-N-nitrosoguanidine. J Clin Invest 1996;98:199–206.
Clark-Langone KM, Sangli C, Krishnakumar J, Watson D. Translating tumor biology into personalized treatment planning: analytical performance characteristics of the oncotype DX colon cancer assay. BMC Cancer. 2010;10:691.
Carethers JM, Chauhan DP, Fink D, Nebel S, Bresalier RS, Howell SB, Boland CR. Mismatch repair proficiency and in vitro response to 5-fluorouracil. Gastroenterology. 1999;117:123–131.
Papouli E, Cejka P, Jiricny J. Dependence of the cytotoxicity of DNA-damaging agents on the mismatch repair status of human cells. Cancer Res 2004;64:3391–3394.
Tajima A, Hess MT, Cabrera BL, Kolodner RD, Carethers JM. The mismatch repair complex hMutS alpha recognizes 5-fluorouracil-modified DNA: implications for chemosensitivity and resistance. Gastroenterology 2004;127:1678–84.
Meyers M, Wagner MW, Mazurek A, Schmutte C, Fishel R, Boothman DA. DNA mismatch repair-dependent response to fluoropyrimidine-generated damage. J Biol Chem 2005;280:5516–13
Arnold CN, Goel A, Boland CR. Role of hMLH1 promoter hypermethylation in drug resistance to 5-fluorouracil in colorectal cancer cell lines. Int J Cancer. 2003;106:66–73.
Ribic CM, Sargent DJ, Moore MJ, Thibodeau SN, French AJ, Goldberg RM, Hamilton SR, Laurent-Puig P, Gryfe R, Shepherd LE, Tu D, Redston M, Gallinger S. Tumor microsatellite-instability status as a predictor of benefit from fluorouracil-based adjuvant chemotherapy for colon cancer. N Engl J Med 2003;349:247–257.
Jover R, Zapater P, Castells A, Llor X, et al. Mismatch repair status in the prediction of benefit from adjuvant fluorouracil chemotherapy in colorectal cancer. Gut 2006;55:848–855.
Fearon ER, Vogelstein B. A genetic model for colorectal tumorigenesis. Cell. 1990;61:759–67.
Jiang Y, Kimchi ET, Staveley-O'Carroll KF, Cheng H, Ajani JA. Assessment of K-ras mutation: a step toward personalized medicine for patients with colorectal cancer. Cancer. 2009;115:3609–17.
Tejpar S, Bertagnolli M, Bosman F, Lenz HJ, Garraway L, Waldman F, Warren R, Bild A, Collins-Brennan D, Hahn H, Harkin DP, Kennedy R, Ilyas M, Morreau H, Proutski V, Swanton C, Tomlinson I, Delorenzi M, Fiocca R, Van Cutsem E, Roth A. Prognostic and predictive biomarkers in resected colon cancer: current status and future perspectives for integrating genomics into biomarker discovery. Oncologist. 2010;15:390–404.
Pritchard CC, Grady WM. Colorectal cancer molecular biology moves into clinical practice. Gut. 2011;60:116–29.
McDermott U, Downing JR, Stratton MR. Genomics and the continuum of cancer care. N Engl J Med. 2011;364:340–50.
Carethers JM. Should African Americans be screened for colorectal cancer at an earlier age? Nat Clin Pract Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2005;2:352–3.
Nambiar PR, Gupta RR, Misra V. An "Omics" based survey of human colon cancer. Mutat Res. 2010;693:3–18.
Ma Y, Ding Z, Qian Y, Shi X, Castranova V, Harner EJ, Guo L. Predicting cancer drug response by proteomic profiling. Clin Cancer Res. 2006;12:4583–9.
Kinross JM, von Roon AC, Holmes E, Darzi A, Nicholson JK. The human gut microbiome: implications for future health care. Curr Gastroenterol Rep. 2008;10:396–403.
Acknowledgments
The contents of this article were presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract during Digestive Diseases Week, May 8, 2011, in Chicago, IL, USA. Supported by the US Public Health Service (DK067287) and the SDSU/UCSD Comprehensive Cancer Center Partnership (CA132379 and CA132384).
Conflicts of interest
There are no conflicts of interest for the author.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Carethers, J.M. Proteomics, Genomics, and Molecular Biology in the Personalized Treatment of Colorectal Cancer. J Gastrointest Surg 16, 1648–1650 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11605-012-1942-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11605-012-1942-2