Abstract 3393: Characterizing recurrent high-grade serous ovarian cancer through whole-genome sequencing

Acquired drug resistance is the major obstacle in controlling high-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSC) and leads to poor overall survival. Comparatively little massively parallel sequencing data exist from HGSC patients with recurrent disease who have been extensively treated with chemotherapy or newer targeted agents, such as anti-angiogenics or PARP inhibitors (PARPi). We previously identified four mechanisms of acquired resistance from whole-genome sequencing (WGS) of 23 HGSC patients with recurrent disease; a resistance mechanism of any kind was only identified in half of the patients. Since 2012, we have collected tumor samples from 16 HGSC patients through our rapid-autopsy program. On average, we collect 17 tumor sites per patient during the autopsy, and to date we have performed WGS on 28 autopsy samples from 8 patients. These data are allowing us to understand HGSC at end-stage, by examining the complete catalog of resistance mechanisms within an individual patient and reconstructing the natural history of HGSC. One acquired resistance mechanism we identified in HGSC involves transcriptional fusion of the drug efflux pump ABCB1 to an upstream gene that causes its overexpression. ABCB1 encodes the multidrug resistance transporter MDR1, also known as P-glycoprotein. Through WGS and targeted RNA sequencing on end-stage tumor samples as well as recurrent ascites samples, we identified multiple fusion partners to ABCB1, with more than 15% of recurrent HGSC patients harboring ABCB1 transcriptional fusions. A number of HGSC patients carry multiple ABCB1 fusions, demonstrating convergent evolution within patients and the strong selective advantage of ABCB1 overexpression by gene fusion. Extending our analysis to recurrent and autopsy samples from breast and prostate cancer patients also identified ABCB1 transcriptional fusions as a resistance mechanism in these cancers. Our findings suggest that ABCB1 transcriptional fusions are a common mechanism of acquired chemotherapy resistance in ovarian, breast and prostate cancer patients, and that characterizing end-stage disease is particularly informative for understanding resistance mechanisms. Citation Format: Elizabeth L. Christie, Swetansu Pattnaik, Sian Fereday, Australian Ovarian Cancer Study, Heather Thorne, Andrea Bild, David D. Bowtell. Characterizing recurrent high-grade serous ovarian cancer through whole-genome sequencing [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2018; 2018 Apr 14-18; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2018;78(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 3393.