Diagnostic yield and clinical relevance of expanded germline genetic testing for nearly 7000 suspected HBOC patients.

Here we report the results of a retrospective germline analysis of 6941 individuals fulfilling the criteria necessary for genetic testing of hereditary breast- and ovarian cancer (HBOC) according to the German S3 or AGO Guidelines. Genetic testing was performed by next-generation sequencing using 123 cancer-associated genes based on the Illumina TruSight® Cancer Sequencing Panel. In 1431 of 6941 cases (20.

Case Report: DPM1-CDG: Novel Variant with Severe Phenotype and Literature Review.

Congenital disorders of glycosylation (CDG) type I include variants in the gene leading to DPM1-CDG. The nine previously reported patients showed developmental delay, seizures, electroencephalography abnormalities and dysmorphic features with varying disease onset and severity. Clinical features of a new patient are described.

Long-term chemoprevention in patients with adenomatous polyposis coli: an observational study.

Prospective short-term studies on effectiveness of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) point towards a decrease in the number and size of polyps. Effectiveness and safety in the prevention of progression in familial polyposis with NSAIDs in long-term use, which is the prerequisite for therapeutic evaluation in prospective studies, is unknown. The total absolute observation period of 54 patients under sulindac was 399 patient years with a mean of 7.

Constitutional chromothripsis of the locus as a cause of genetic predisposition to colon cancer.

Purpose: Approximately 20% of patients with clinical familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP) remain unsolved after molecular genetic analysis of the and other polyposis genes, suggesting additional pathomechanisms.

Methods: We applied multidimensional genomic analysis employing chromosomal microarray profiling, optical mapping, long-read genome and RNA sequencing combined with FISH and standard PCR of genomic and complementary DNA to decode a patient with an attenuated FAP that had remained unsolved by Sanger sequencing and multigene panel next-generation sequencing for years.

Results: We identified a complex 3.

Prevalence of CNV-neutral structural genomic rearrangements in MLH1, MSH2, and PMS2 not detectable in routine NGS diagnostics.

Routine diagnostics for colorectal cancer patients suspected of having Lynch-Syndrome (LS) currently uses Next-Generation-Sequencing (NGS) of targeted regions within the DNA mismatch repair (MMR) genes. This analysis can reliably detect nucleotide alterations and copy-number variations (CNVs); however, CNV-neutral rearrangements comprising gene inversions or large intronic insertions remain undetected because their breakpoints are usually not covered. As several founder mutations exist for LS, we established PCR-based screening methods for five known rearrangements in MLH1, MSH2, or PMS2, and investigated their prevalence in 98 German patients with suspicion of LS without a causative germline variant or CNV detectable in the four MMR genes.

Comprehensive analysis of the promoter region in 480 patients with colorectal cancer and 1150 controls reveals new variants including one with a heritable constitutional epimutation.

Background: Germline defects in , , and predisposing for Lynch syndrome (LS) are mainly based on sequence changes, whereas a constitutional epimutation of (CEM) is exceptionally rare. This abnormal promoter methylation is not hereditary when arising de novo, whereas a stably heritable and variant-induced CEM was described for one single allele. We searched for promoter variants causing a germline or somatic methylation induction or transcriptional repression.

Measurements of ultrasonic backscattered spectral centroid shift from spine in vivo: methodology and preliminary results.

Ultrasonic backscatter measurements from vertebral bodies (L3 and L4) in nine women were performed using a clinical ultrasonic imaging system. Measurements were made through the abdomen. The location of a vertebra was identified from the bright specular reflection from the vertebral anterior surface.

Introducing a single-cell-derived human mesenchymal stem cell line expressing hTERT after lentiviral gene transfer.

Human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) can be readily isolated from bone marrow and differentiate into multiple tissues, making them a promising target for future cell and gene therapy applications. The low frequency of hMSCs in bone marrow necessitates their isolation and expansion in vitro prior to clinical use, but due to senescence-associated growth arrest during culture, limited cell numbers can be generated. The lifespan of hMSCs has been extended by ectopic expression of human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) using retroviral vectors.