MicroRNAs characterize genetic diversity and drug resistance in pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Homo sapiens

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) regulate activity of protein-coding genes including those involved in hematopoietic cancers. The goal of the current study was to explore which miRNAs are unique for seven different subtypes of pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Therefore, the expression levels of 397 miRNAs (including novel miRNAs) were measured by quantitative RT-PCR in 81 pediatric leukemia cases and 17 normal hematopoietic control cases. Except for BCR-ABL-positive and B-other ALL, all major subtypes i.e. T-ALL, MLL-rearranged, TEL-AML1-positive, E2A-PBX1-positive and hyperdiploid ALL have unique miRNA-signatures that differ from each other and from those in healthy hematopoietic cells. Strikingly, the miRNA signature between TEL-AML1-positive and hyperdiploid cases partly overlapped, which suggests a common underlying biology. Moreover, aberrant downregulation of let-7b (~70-fold) in MLL-rearranged ALL was linked to upregulation of oncoprotein c-Myc (P median LC50) to the drug in question. The ∆Ct value was calculated according to the following equation: Ct value of the specific miRNA minus the Ct value of the internal reference. In case of the TaqMan MicroRNA Array MicroRNA arrays the mean Ct values for snoR-13 and snoR-14 were used as reference whereas in case of the Custom TaqMan MicroRNA Array arrays snoR-1 was used. MiRNAs validated by the TaqMan MicroRNA Array MicroRNA arrays are listed together with the part numbers of the corresponding (stem-loop) primers as available by Applied Biosystems, Foster City, USA. Primers for the remaining miRNAs were custom designed by Applied Biosystems. Abbreviations: MLL: MLL-rearranged precursor B-ALL, B-other: precursor B-ALL negative for MLL-rearrangements, TEL-AML1, BCR-ABL, E2A-PBX and hyperdiploidy (> 50 chromosomes). CD34+: normal CD34+-sorted blood progenitor cells, nBM: normal bone marrow.