RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Whole Genome Doubling mitigates Muller’s Ratchet in Cancer Evolution
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 513457
DO 10.1101/513457
A1 López, Saioa
A1 Lim, Emilia
A1 Huebner, Ariana
A1 Dietzen, Michelle
A1 Mourikis, Thanos
A1 Watkins, Thomas B.K.
A1 Rowan, Andrew
A1 Dewhurst, Sally M.
A1 Birkbak, Nicolai J.
A1 Wilson, Gareth A.
A1 Jamal-Hanjani, Mariam
A1 Swanton, Charles
A1 ,
A1 McGranahan, Nicholas
YR 2019
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/01/07/513457.abstract
AB Whole genome doubling (WGD) is a prevalent macro-evolutionary event in cancer, involving a doubling of the entire chromosome complement. However, despite its prevalence and clinical prognostic relevance, the evolutionary selection pressures for WGD have not been investigated. Here, we explored whether WGD may act to mitigate the irreversible, inexorable ratchet-like, accumulation of deleterious mutations in essential genes. Utilizing 1050 tumor regions from 816 non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLC), we temporally dissect mutations to determine their temporal acquisition in relation to WGD. We find evidence for strong negative selection against homozygous loss of essential cancer genes prior to WGD. However, mutations in essential genes occurring after duplication were not subject to significant negative selection, consistent with WGD providing a buffering effect, decreasing the likelihood of homozygous loss. Finally, we demonstrate that loss of heterozygosity and temporal dissection of mutations can be exploited to identify signals of positive selection in lung, breast, colorectal cancer and other cancer types, enabling the elucidation of novel tumour suppressor genes and a deeper characterization of known cancer genes.