Shivangi Wani

TL;DR: Detailed genomic analysis of 456 pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas identified 32 recurrently mutated genes that aggregate into 10 pathways: KRAS, TGF-β, WNT, NOTCH, ROBO/SLIT signalling, G1/S transition, SWI-SNF, chromatin modification, DNA repair and RNA processing.

TL;DR: Genomic instability co-segregated with inactivation of DNA maintenance genes (BRCA1, BRCA2 or PALB2) and a mutational signature of DNA damage repair deficiency, and 4 of 5 individuals with these measures of defective DNA maintenance responded to platinum therapy.

TL;DR: It is found that frequent and diverse somatic aberrations in genes described traditionally as embryonic regulators of axon guidance, particularly SLIT/ROBO signalling, are also evident in murine Sleeping Beauty transposon-mediated somatic mutagenesis models of pancreatic cancer, providing further supportive evidence for the potential involvement ofAxon guidance genes in pancreatic carcinogenesis.

TL;DR: A massive-scale RNA sequencing protocol, short quantitative random RNA libraries or SQRL, is developed, highlighting how SQRL can be used to characterize transcriptome content and dynamics in a quantitative and reproducible manner, and suggesting that the understanding of transcriptional complexity is far from complete.

TL;DR: It is reported that 6–30% of cap-selected mouse and human RNA transcripts initiate within repetitive elements, and it is concluded that retrotransposon transcription has a key influence upon the transcriptional output of the mammalian genome.