No abstract

Characteristics of tumour tissues can be used to predict outcomes for individual patients with cancer, as well as help to choose their best treatment. Biopsy of liver cancers carries risks, however, and is usually avoided. Some cancer cells enter the blood, and although they are very rare, we have developed a method of finding and characterising them in patients with liver cancer, which we hope will provide a low risk means of guiding treatment.

Purpose Therapy resistance and associated liver disease make hepatocellular cancers (HCC) difficult to treat with traditional cytotoxic therapies, while newer targeted approaches offer only modest survival benefit. We focused on DNA-dependent protein kinase, DNA-PKcs, encoded by PRKDC and central to DNA damage repair by non-homologous end joining. Our aim was to explore its roles in hepatocarcinogenesis and as a novel therapeutic candidate. Experimental Design PRKDC was characterised in liver tissues from of 132 patients (normal liver (n=10), cirrhotic liver (n=13), dysplastic nodules (n=18), HCC (n=91)) using Affymetrix U133 Plus 2.0 and 500K Human Mapping SNP arrays (cohort 1). In addition, we studied a case series of 45 patients with HCC undergoing diagnostic biopsy (cohort 2). Histological grading, response to treatment and survival were correlated with DNA-PKcs quantified immunohistochemically. Parallel in vitro studies determined the impact of DNA-PK on DNA repair and response to cytotoxic therapy. Results Increased PRKDC expression in HCC was associated with amplification of its genetic locus in cohort 1. In cohort 2, elevated DNA-PKcs identified patients with treatment-resistant HCC, progressing at a median of 4.5 months compared to 16.9 months, while elevation of activated pDNA-PK independently predicted poorer survival. DNA-PKcs was high in HCC cell lines, where its inhibition with NU7441 potentiated irradiation and doxorubicin-induced cytoxicity, while the combination suppressed HCC growth in vitro and in vivo. Conclusions These data identify PRKDC/DNA-PKcs as a candidate driver of hepatocarcinogenesis, whose biopsy characterisation at diagnosis may impact stratification of current therapies, and whose specific future targeting may overcome resistance.

CoNClUSIoNS: Lenvatinib plus anti-PD1 exerted unique immunomodulatory effects through activation of immune pathways, reduction of Treg cell infiltrate, and inhibition of TGFß signaling. A gene signature enabled the identification of ~20% of human HCCs that, although nonresponding to single agents, could benefit from the proposed combination. (Hepatology 2021;74:2652-2669. L iver cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer-related death and a major health problem globally. (1) HCC is the most common form of liver cancer, accounting for >90% of