Molecular characterization of Indian Prostate Cancer
Our research group in collaboration with GSVM medical college, Kanpur; King George’s Medical University, Lucknow and All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi for the first time screened Indian prostate cancer (PCa) cohort for the known genetic alterations. Our group for the first time characterized Indian PCa patients’ specimens for ERG, ETV1, ETV4 and RAF kinase genetic rearrangements, SPINK1 over-expression and PTEN deletion by employing immunohistochemistry (IHC) and Fluorescence in-situ Hybridization (FISH). We revealed high recurrence of TMPRSS2-ERG (~50% recurrent) and SPINK1 over-expression (~12% recurrent) among Indian PCa patients. Most importantly, we found higher incidence of RAF genetic rearrangements among Indian prostate cancer patients (~6% in Indian PCa as compared to ~2% in Caucasian), indicating that these patients may respond to the FDA-approved RAF kinase inhibitors or MEK inhibitors which are already available in the clinic (Prostate, 2015). This work represents the first comprehensive molecular subtyping of prostate cancer cohort from the Indian subcontinent, which has a huge potential for direct diagnostic, tailored therapeutic intervention and translational impact.

(A) IHC staining for ERG rearrangement and SPINK1 in Indian PCa patients. (B) Summary of molecular subtypes in prostate cancer. (C) Circos depicting racial disparity associated with molecular subtypes of prostate cancer (Trends in Cancer, 2016).

Exploration of Novel Molecular Drivers and Mechanistic Circuitry of Indian Prostate Cancer
Prostate cancer has been known to evolve from diverse genetic alterations including mutations, gene fusions/rearrangements, amplifications/deletions, and other aberrations that perturb gene expression levels. The major drift in field of prostate cancer genomics has been the sub-classification of tumors into distinct molecular subtypes. Emerging high throughput technologies such as Next Generation Sequencing will dictate the developments in personalized genomic medicine in the near future. Although majority of Our group’s major focus of research is to fully understand the entire spectrum of genetic/epigenetic aberrations that occur in cancer patients specifically in the Indian subcontinent. Our previous efforts successfully delineated the common molecular subtypes for Indian PCa patients using a targeted IHC/FISH-based approaches. We to explore the comprehensive mutational landscape of these patients representing the entire disease-spectrum (primary to metastatic disease), understand the pathobiology of the newly identified mutation(s) and identify actionable alterations.