A Novel Multi-analyte Approach to Democratize Cancer Biobanking

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT The objective of this proposal is to establish a simplified and accessible procedure for multi-analyte simultaneous extraction of DNA, RNA, and protein from tumor touch imprints that democratizes biobanking for low-resource institutes. Traditional biobanking of fresh-frozen or FFPE tissue is resource-heavy and requires dedicated staff, expertise, and storage facilities that may not be available at smaller institutes, which has the unintended impact of disenfranchising lower socioeconomic populations. For example, only 1 in 10 specimens collected by the Can- cer Disparities Research Network were from non-white patients. Thus, there is a need for improvements in pro- curement technologies to address biobanking discrepancies. In addition, early detection and early treatment re- sults in increasingly smaller tumor sizes obtained at surgery, which requires maximizing molecular recovery from a single small sample. Our proposed approach will leverage tumor touch imprints on glass slides as a method for biobanking, in combination with a multi-analyte molecular extraction protocol previously developed for forensic applications. The technique enables simultaneous recovery of DNA, RNA, and protein from the same small sample, including samples consisting of less than 10,000 cells. Our aims include optimization of the mo- lecular extraction protocol from air dried touch imprints, and demonstration of non-inferiority relative to fresh- frozen tissue and conventional molecular extraction methods. We will further optimize procedures to minimize pre-analytical variables around storage time, storage method, and compatibility with fixation and cellular stain- ing. Molecular yield and integrity will be measured and compared to fresh-frozen tissue. Recovered molecular content will be assessed by DNA sequencing, RNA sequencing and protein analytics (Mass spectrometry and/or protein arrays). If successful, our approach could provide a simplified method for multi-parametric analysis of smaller sized tumors, including genomic analysis, gene expression profiling, and protein expression and activa- tion, broadening the options for biomarker discovery as well as enabling correlative analysis of all analytes from the same sample.