Shared genetics between breast cancer and predisposing diseases identifies novel breast cancer treatment candidates.

Background: Current effective breast cancer treatment options have severe side effects, highlighting a need for new therapies. Drug repurposing can accelerate improvements to care, as FDA-approved drugs have known safety and pharmacological profiles. Some drugs for other conditions, such as metformin, an antidiabetic, have been tested in clinical trials for repurposing for breast cancer.

Shared etiology of Mendelian and complex disease supports drug discovery.

Background: Drugs targeting disease causal genes are more likely to succeed for that disease. However, complex disease causal genes are not always clear. In contrast, Mendelian disease causal genes are well-known and druggable.

Shared genetics between breast cancer and predisposing diseases identifies novel breast cancer treatment candidates.

Background: Current effective breast cancer treatment options have severe side effects, highlighting a need for new therapies. Drug repurposing can accelerate improvements to care, as FDA-approved drugs have known safety and pharmacological profiles. Some drugs for other conditions, such as metformin, an antidiabetic, have been tested in clinical trials for repurposing for breast cancer.

Shared etiology of Mendelian and complex disease supports drug discovery.

Background: Drugs targeting disease causal genes are more likely to succeed for that disease. However, complex disease causal genes are not always clear. In contrast, Mendelian disease causal genes are well-known and druggable.

Reduction of Phosphorylated Tau in Alzheimer's Disease Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Neuro-Spheroids by Rho-Associated Coiled-Coil Kinase Inhibitor Fasudil.

Background: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most predominant form of dementia. Rho-associated coiled coil kinase (ROCK) inhibitor, fasudil, is one of the candidate drugs against the AD progression.

Objective: We aimed to investigate possible changes of AD associated markers in three-dimensional neuro-spheroids (3D neuro-spheroids) generated from induced pluripotent stem cells derived from AD patients or healthy control subjects (HC) and to determine the impact of pharmacological intervention with the ROCK inhibitor fasudil.

Development and application of an evidence-based directed acyclic graph to evaluate the associations between metal mixtures and cardiometabolic outcomes.

Objectives: Specifying causal models to assess relationships among metal mixtures and cardiometabolic outcomes requires evidence-based models of the causal structures; however, such models have not been previously published. The objective of this study was to develop and evaluate a directed acyclic graph (DAG) diagraming metal mixture exposure and cardiometabolic outcomes.

Methods: We conducted a literature search to develop the DAG of metal mixtures and cardiometabolic outcomes.

Using indication embeddings to represent patient health for drug safety studies.

Objective: The electronic health record is a rising resource for quantifying medical practice, discovering the adverse effects of drugs, and studying comparative effectiveness. One of the challenges of applying these methods to health care data is the high dimensionality of the health record. Methods to discover the effects of drugs in health data must account for tens of thousands of potentially relevant confounders.

Patchwork of contrasting medication cultures across the USA.

Health in the United States is markedly heterogeneous, with large disparities in disease incidence, treatment choices and health spending. Drug prescription is one major component of health care-reflecting the accuracy of diagnosis, the adherence to evidence-based guidelines, susceptibility to drug marketing and regulatory factors. Using medical claims data covering nearly half of the USA population, we have developed and validated a framework to compare prescription rates of 600 popular drugs in 2334 counties.

Genomic Characterization of Dysplastic Nevi Unveils Implications for Diagnosis of Melanoma.

A well-defined risk factor and precursor for cutaneous melanoma is the dysplastic nevus. These benign tumors represent clonal hyperproliferation of melanocytes that are in a senescent-like state, but with occasional malignant transformation events. To portray the mutational repertoire of dysplastic nevi in patients with the dysplastic nevus syndrome and to determine the discriminatory profiles of melanocytic nevi (including dysplastic nevi) from melanoma, we sequenced exomes of melanocytic nevi including dysplastic nevi (n = 19), followed by a targeted gene panel (785 genes) characterization of melanocytic nevi (n = 46) and primary melanomas (n = 42).

An information theoretic method to identify combinations of genomic alterations that promote glioblastoma.

Tumors are the result of accumulated genomic alterations that cooperate synergistically to produce uncontrollable cell growth. Although identifying recurrent alterations among large collections of tumors provides a way to pinpoint genes that endow a selective advantage in oncogenesis and progression, it fails to address the genetic interactions behind this selection process. A non-random pattern of co-mutated genes is evidence for selective forces acting on tumor cells that harbor combinations of these genetic alterations.

Genetic similarity between cancers and comorbid Mendelian diseases identifies candidate driver genes.

Despite large-scale cancer genomics studies, key somatic mutations driving cancer, and their functional roles, remain elusive. Here, we propose that analysis of comorbidities of Mendelian diseases with cancers provides a novel, systematic way to discover new cancer genes. If germline genetic variation in Mendelian loci predisposes bearers to common cancers, the same loci may harbour cancer-associated somatic variation.

Data-driven discovery of seasonally linked diseases from an Electronic Health Records system.

Background: Patterns of disease incidence can identify new risk factors for the disease or provide insight into the etiology. For example, allergies and infectious diseases have been shown to follow periodic temporal patterns due to seasonal changes in environmental or infectious agents. Previous work searching for seasonal or other temporal patterns in disease diagnosis rates has been limited both in the scope of the diseases examined and in the ability to distinguish unexpected seasonal patterns.

FBXW7 mutations in melanoma and a new therapeutic paradigm.

Background: Melanoma is a heterogeneous tumor with subgroups requiring distinct therapeutic strategies. Genetic dissection of melanoma subgroups and identification of therapeutic agents are of great interest in the field. These efforts will ultimately lead to treatment strategies, likely combinatorial, based on genetic information.