Complex rearrangements and oncogene amplifications revealed by long-read DNA and RNA sequencing of a breast cancer cell line

  1. Michael C Schatz6,7
  1. 1 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory;
  2. 2 Ontario Institute for Cancer Research;
  3. 3 Baylor College of Medicine;
  4. 4 University of Vienna;
  5. 5 Pacific Biosciences;
  6. 6 Johns Hopkins University
  • * Corresponding author; email: mschatz{at}cs.jhu.edu
  • Abstract

    The SK-BR-3 cell line is one of the most important models for HER2+ breast cancers, which affect one in five breast cancer patients. SK-BR-3 is known to be highly rearranged although much of the variation is in complex and repetitive regions that may be underreported. Addressing this, we sequenced SK-BR-3 using long-read single molecule sequencing from Pacific Biosciences, and develop one of the most detailed maps of structural variations (SVs) in a cancer genome available with nearly 20,000 variants present, most of which were missed by short read sequencing. Surrounding the important ERBB2 oncogene (also known as HER2), we discover a complex sequence of nested duplications and translocations, suggesting a punctuated progression. Full-length transcriptome sequencing further revealed several novel gene fusions within the nested genomic variants. Combining long-read genome and transcriptome sequencing enables an in-depth analysis of how SVs disrupt the genome and sheds new light on the complex mechanisms involved in cancer genome evolution.

    • Received October 9, 2017.
    • Accepted June 27, 2018.

    This article is distributed exclusively by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press for the first six months after the full-issue publication date (see http://genome.cshlp.org/site/misc/terms.xhtml). After six months, it is available under a Creative Commons License (Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International), as described at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

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