CNApp, a tool for the quantification of copy number alterations and integrative analysis revealing clinical implications

  1. Sebastià Franch-Expósito
  2. Laia Bassaganyas
  3. Maria Vila-Casadesús
  4. Eva Hernández-Illán
  5. Roger Esteban-Fabró
  6. Marcos Díaz-Gay
  7. Juan José Lozano
  8. Antoni Castells
  9. Josep Maria Llovet
  10. Sergi Castellvi-Bel  Is a corresponding author
  11. Jordi Camps  Is a corresponding author
  1. Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Spain
  2. Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Spain

Abstract

Somatic copy number alterations (CNAs) are a hallmark of cancer, but their role in tumorigenesis and clinical relevance remain largely unclear. Here we developed CNApp, a web-based tool that allows a comprehensive exploration of CNAs by using purity-corrected segmented data from multiple genomic platforms. CNApp generates genome-wide profiles, computes CNA scores for broad, focal and global CNA burdens, and uses machine learning-based predictions to classify samples. We applied CNApp to the TCGA pan-cancer dataset of 10,635 genomes showing that CNAs classify cancer types according to their tissue-of-origin, and that each cancer type shows specific ranges of broad and focal CNA scores. Moreover, CNApp reproduces recurrent CNAs in hepatocellular carcinoma, and predicts colon cancer molecular subtypes and microsatellite instability based on broad CNA scores and discrete genomic imbalances. In summary, CNApp facilitates CNA-driven research by providing a unique framework to identify relevant clinical implications. CNApp is hosted at https://tools.idibaps.org/CNApp/.

Data availability

Data and plots presented in the submission were generated by using our CNApp tool. Source code and additional files can be found at GitHub (https://github.com/ait5/CNApp).

The following previously published data sets were used

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Sebastià Franch-Expósito

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-4542-1701
  2. Laia Bassaganyas

    Liver Cancer Translational Research Group, Liver Unit, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  3. Maria Vila-Casadesús

    Bioinformatics Unit, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  4. Eva Hernández-Illán

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  5. Roger Esteban-Fabró

    Liver Cancer Translational Research Group, Liver Unit, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  6. Marcos Díaz-Gay

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-0658-0467
  7. Juan José Lozano

    Bioinformatics Unit, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  8. Antoni Castells

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-8431-2033
  9. Josep Maria Llovet

    Liver Cancer Translational Research Group, Liver Unit, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    Competing interests
    Josep Maria Llovet, is receiving research support from Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Eisai Inc, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Ipsen, and consulting fees from Eli Lilly, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Bristol-Myers Squibb, EISAI Inc, Celsion Corporation, Exelixis, Merck, Ipsen, Glycotest, Navigant, Leerink Swann LLC, Midatech Ltd, and Nucleix.
  10. Sergi Castellvi-Bel

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    For correspondence
    SBEL@clinic.cat
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
  11. Jordi Camps

    Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Oncology Team, Institut D'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Hospital Clínic de Barcelona, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Hepáticas y Digestivas (CIBEREHD), Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
    For correspondence
    JCAMPS@clinic.cat
    Competing interests
    No competing interests declared.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0003-2929-4228

Funding

CIBEREHD

  • Sebastià Franch-Expósito

Fundacion Cientifica de la Asociacion Espanola Contra el Cancer (GCB13131592CAST)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

European Commission /Horizon 2020 Program (HEPCAR Ref. 667273-2)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

U.S. Department of Defense (CA150272P3)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

National Cancer Institute (P30-CA196521)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

Samuel Waxman Cancer Research Foundation

  • Josep Maria Llovet

Spanish National Health Institute (SAF2016-76390)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

Generalitat de Catalunya/AGAUR (SGR-1162)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

Generalitat de Catalunya/AGAUR (SGR-1358)

  • Josep Maria Llovet

European Regional Development Fund (PI14/00783)

  • Marcos Díaz-Gay
  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

European Regional Development Fund (PI17/01304)

  • Marcos Díaz-Gay
  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2016BP00161)

  • Laia Bassaganyas

European Regional Development Fund (PI17/00878)

  • Marcos Díaz-Gay
  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

Generalitat de Catalunya (2017 SGR 21)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

Generalitat de Catalunya (2017 SGR 653)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

Generalitat de Catalunya (AGAUR 2018FI B1_00213)

  • Marcos Díaz-Gay

Spanish National Health Institute (FPI BES-2017-081286)

  • Roger Esteban-Fabró

European Comission (PCIG11-GA-2012-321937)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

European Regional Development Fund (CP13/00160)

  • Marcos Díaz-Gay
  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

CERCA Program

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Josep Maria Llovet
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

Generalitat de Catalunya (2017 SGR 1035)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

PERIS Generalitat de Catalunya (SLT002/16/00398)

  • Juan José Lozano
  • Antoni Castells
  • Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  • Jordi Camps

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Copyright

© 2020, Franch-Expósito et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 9,786
    views
  • 497
    downloads
  • 50
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Sebastià Franch-Expósito
  2. Laia Bassaganyas
  3. Maria Vila-Casadesús
  4. Eva Hernández-Illán
  5. Roger Esteban-Fabró
  6. Marcos Díaz-Gay
  7. Juan José Lozano
  8. Antoni Castells
  9. Josep Maria Llovet
  10. Sergi Castellvi-Bel
  11. Jordi Camps
(2020)
CNApp, a tool for the quantification of copy number alterations and integrative analysis revealing clinical implications
eLife 9:e50267.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.50267

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.50267

Further reading

    1. Computational and Systems Biology
    David B Blumenthal, Marta Lucchetta ... Martin H Schaefer
    Research Article Updated

    Degree distributions in protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks are believed to follow a power law (PL). However, technical and study biases affect the experimental procedures for detecting PPIs. For instance, cancer-associated proteins have received disproportional attention. Moreover, bait proteins in large-scale experiments tend to have many false-positive interaction partners. Studying the degree distributions of thousands of PPI networks of controlled provenance, we address the question if PL distributions in observed PPI networks could be explained by these biases alone. Our findings are supported by mathematical models and extensive simulations, and indicate that study bias and technical bias suffice to produce the observed PL distribution. It is, hence, problematic to derive hypotheses about the topology of the true biological interactome from the PL distributions in observed PPI networks. Our study casts doubt on the use of the PL property of biological networks as a modeling assumption or quality criterion in network biology.

    1. Computational and Systems Biology
    2. Immunology and Inflammation
    Peng Li, Sree Pulugulla ... Warren J Leonard
    Short Report

    Transcription factor partners can cooperatively bind to DNA composite elements to augment gene transcription. Here, we report a novel protein-DNA binding screening pipeline, termed Spacing Preference Identification of Composite Elements (SPICE), that can systematically predict protein binding partners and DNA motif spacing preferences. Using SPICE, we successfully identified known composite elements, such as AP1-IRF composite elements (AICEs) and STAT5 tetramers, and also uncovered several novel binding partners, including JUN-IKZF1 composite elements. One such novel interaction was identified at CNS9, an upstream conserved noncoding region in the human IL10 gene, which harbors a non-canonical IKZF1 binding site. We confirmed the cooperative binding of JUN and IKZF1 and showed that the activity of an IL10-luciferase reporter construct in primary B and T cells depended on both this site and the AP1 binding site within this composite element. Overall, our findings reveal an unappreciated global association of IKZF1 and AP1 and establish SPICE as a valuable new pipeline for predicting novel transcription binding complexes.