Gene expression signature of castrate resistant prostate cancer

Prostate gland is a highly androgen dependent gland. The first line of treatment for metastatic prostate cancer therefore, is androgen ablation. This can be achieved by multiple non-surgical methods. However, most of these cancers although respond well initially, become resistant to androgen ablation sooner or later. These cancers then become extremely aggressive and difficult to treat, thereby drastically affect the patient prognosis. A gene expression signature for castrate resistant prostate cancer would be useful in identification of mechanisms responsible for castrate resistance, as well as to predict the progression of the cancer into castrate resistance. For this, our group has done a RNA-seq analysis of a. Control group (C); b. Castrate Sensitive group (B) and c. Castrate Resistant group (A). Gene expression profiling was performed on these samples using RNA-seq. Differentially expressed genes between control and castrate sensitive as well as control and castrate resistant groups were identified. In order to find a gene expression signature of castrate resistant prostate cancer, biopsy samples from a. Control (Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia), b. Castrate Sensitive and c. Castrate Resistant prostate cancer were collected. Total RNA was isolated then subjected to RNA-seq on HiSeq platform. Genes differentially expressd between the groups were identified and grouped as CaS and CaR genes.