Aggressive Prostate Cancer Phenotype and Genome-Wide Association Studies: Where are we Now?

Abstract

The majority of prostate cancer (PCa) is indolent, however, a percentage of patients are initially diagnosed with metastatic disease, for which there is a worse prognosis. There is a lack of biomarkers to identify men at greater risk for developing aggressive PCa. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) scan the genome to search associations of SNPs with specific traits, like cancer. To date, eight GWAS have resulted in the reporting of 16 SNPs associated with aggressive PCa (p < 5.00 × 10^-2). Still, validation studies need to be conducted to confirm the obtained results as GWAS can generate false-positive results. Furthermore, post-GWAS studies provide a better understanding of the functional consequences.

Keywords::

• aggressive prostate cancer
• GWAS
• polymorphisms
• validation

Supplementary data

To view the supplementary data that accompany this paper please visit the journal website at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/suppl/10.2217/pgs-2019-0123

Financial & competing interests disclosure

The study was funded by IPO Porto (project no. PI111-CI-IPOP-91-2018 from the Research Center the Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Porto, Portugal). J Silva (CI-IPOP-BPD2018/UID/DTP/00776/POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006868) is a grant holder from FCT/MCTES through national funds (PIDDAC) and cofunded by Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) through Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI). The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

The study was funded by IPO Porto (project no. PI111-CI-IPOP-91-2018 from the Research Center the Portuguese Institute of Oncology of Porto, Portugal). J Silva (CI-IPOP-BPD2018/UID/DTP/00776/POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006868) is a grant holder from FCT/MCTES through national funds (PIDDAC) and cofunded by Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) through Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI). The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed. No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.