A Novel ELISA-Based Peptide Biosensor Assay for Screening ABL1 Activity : A Challenge for Precision Therapy in BCR-ABL1 and BCR-ABL1 Like Leukemias.

The pathogenic role of the overactivated ABL1 tyrosine kinase (TK) pathway is well recognized in some forms of like acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL); TK inhibitors represent a useful therapeutic choice in these patients who respond poorly to conventional chemotherapy. Here we report a novel peptide biosensor (P)-ELISA assay to investigate ABL1 activity in four immortalized leukemic cell lines with different genetic background. The P sequence comprises an ABL1 tyrosine (Y) phosphorylation site and a targeting sequence that increases the specificity for ABL1; additional peptides (Y-site-mutated (P-) and fully-phosphorylated (P-) biosensors) were included in the assay.

Targeting Kinase-activating Genetic Lesions to Improve Therapy of Pediatric Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common hematologic malignancy in children, characterized by an abnormal proliferation of immature lymphoid cells. Thanks to risk-adapted combination chemotherapy treatments currently used, survival at 5 years has reached 90%. ALL is a heterogeneous disease from a genetic point of view: patients' lymphoblasts may harbor in fact several chromosomal alterations, some of which have prognostic and therapeutic value.