Developing new prognostic tools for prostate cancer (PCa) is vital owing to the disease's high incidence and mortality as well as morbidity resulting from current forms of therapy. Moreover, there are problematic limitations in our ability to predict patients who are most likely to die from PCa. If identified, these patients would benefit from additional therapies along with standard of care therapies. The ability to identify these patients in both in the biopsy setting and post-surgically would represent an important advancement in the field. The Baylor tumor microenvironment group has been at the forefront of establishing the predictive value of microenvironment-derived biomarkers. Our previous studies have shown that the tumor microenvironment reactive stroma promotes angiogenesis, tumor incidence and rate of tumor growth. Furthermore, we have reported that reactive stroma grading (RSG) is a significant predictor of PSA recurrence and PCa-specific mortality. Reliability and reproducibility are critical issues in biomarker development. To overcome this, it is essential to convert a biomarker to a truly quantitative test by focusing on analytical conditions. The overall goal of the proposed project is to produce a rigorous quantitative tumor microenvironment-based test, reproducible across populations that will supplement and improve currently used predictive tools and models. This test will be useful for both prostatectomy and biopsy specimens, to predict clinical outcomes and contribute to clinical decision-making. Our group is uniquely positioned to carry this work forward. Baylor College of Medicine has unique tissue and data resources. This will represent a major advancement. We hypothesize that we can improve on current standard-of-care predictive models, through the addition of novel tumor microenvironment-based biomarkers that are quantitative and reproducible, to support clinical decisions on whether a PCa patient would benefit by receiving more aggressive additional therapies. We propose three Specific Aims to address this hypothesis:
Specific Aim 1 : To develop predictive tools that will select patients who need adjuvant treatments above surgical therapy standard of care Specific Aim 2: To develop pre-treatment predictive tools, using biopsy tissues, for the selection of patients who could potentially benefit from additional treatments along with surgery or radiation Specific Aim 3: To identify key regulators of the microenvironment response in human PCa.

Public Health Relevance

There is an imperative need to develop additional prognostic tools to identify prostate cancer patients who would benefit from receiving more aggressive therapies. Development of makers within the tumor microenvironment and use of advanced imaging and analytical technology will enable this process. Development of the proposed predictive models will benefit public health.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Cancer Institute (NCI)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01CA140734-04
Application #
8676696
Study Section
Cancer Biomarkers Study Section (CBSS)
Program Officer
Mckee, Tawnya C
Project Start
2011-08-15
Project End
2016-05-31
Budget Start
2014-06-01
Budget End
2015-05-31
Support Year
4
Fiscal Year
2014
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
University of Texas Health Science Center Houston
Department
Pathology
Type
Schools of Medicine
DUNS #
City
Houston
State
TX
Country
United States
Zip Code
77225
Coarfa, Christian; Florentin, Diego; Putluri, NagiReddy et al. (2018) Influence of the neural microenvironment on prostate cancer. Prostate 78:128-139
Hammerich, Kai H; Frolov, Anna; Li, Rile et al. (2017) Cellular interactions of the phosphorylated form of AKT in prostate cancer. Hum Pathol 63:98-109
De Vivar, Andrea Diaz; Sayeeduddin, Mohammad; Rowley, David et al. (2017) Histologic features of stromogenic carcinoma of the prostate (carcinomas with reactive stroma grade 3). Hum Pathol 63:202-211
Ayala, Gustavo; Frolov, Anna; Chatterjee, Deyali et al. (2015) Expression of ERG protein in prostate cancer: variability and biological correlates. Endocr Relat Cancer 22:277-87
Olar, Adriana; He, Dandan; Florentin, Diego et al. (2014) Biological correlates of prostate cancer perineural invasion diameter. Hum Pathol 45:1365-9
Olar, Adriana; He, Dandan; Florentin, Diego et al. (2014) Biologic correlates and significance of axonogenesis in prostate cancer. Hum Pathol 45:1358-64
Ayala, Gustavo; Frolov, Anna; Ittman, Michael et al. (2013) Biological correlates of biochemical recurrence free survival using multiple markers in a large tissue microarray cohort. Ann Clin Lab Sci 43:11-21
Ding, Yi; He, Dandan; Florentin, Diego et al. (2013) Semaphorin 4F as a critical regulator of neuroepithelial interactions and a biomarker of aggressive prostate cancer. Clin Cancer Res 19:6101-11