Uveal melanoma prognoses vary depending on genomic subset

Source: Healio, October 2017

Four molecularly distinct subtypes of uveal melanomas have been identified, two with poorer prognosis and two with better prognosis, according to a study.
In a multiplatform analysis of 80 uveal melanomas, an international team of researchers used DNA sequencing to identify complex alterations in BAP1 that were not previously identified using standard algorithms.
Two subsets of the poorer prognosis tumor group, monosomy 3 (M3-UM), were found to have similar BAP1 alterations but different copy number alterations, RNA expression and cellular pathway activity. Two subsets of better prognosis tumor group, disomy 3 (D3-UM), were distinguished by somatic copy number changes and DNA methylation profiles. BAP1 alterations were observed in 85% of the M3-UM subgroups.