Poster - #VH-44516 - Keywords: colorectal cancer CRC polyps adenoma microbiome bacteria

A NOVEL MICROBIOME PROFILING PLATFORM FOR DETECTION OF COLORECTAL CANCER AND ADVANCED PRECANCEROUS LESIONS

D. Fasulo1, E. Jackson1, C. Clark1, R. Beach1, P, Denslow1, R. Bresalier2, P. Paizs3, J. Kinross3, J. Levine4, A. Geis5, F.M. Giardiello5, C.L. Sears5,6, M. Driscoll1
1 Intus Bio, Farmington CT, USA, 2 MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston TX, USA, 3 Imperial College London, London, UK, 4 Univ. Of Connecticut, CT, USA, 5 Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, and Biofilm Study Consortium

ABSTRACT:
Conclusions
High-resolution bacterial sequencing enables robust CRC diagnostics. Substrain-level bacterial sequence CRC signatures are present in fecal samples of patients with advanced colorectal polyps and colorectal cancer. Blinded sample accuracy matches current fecal CRC diagnostic sensitivity and specificity, demonstrating for the first time that high resolution bacterial sequence signatures can have comparable sensitivity and specificity to human –omics blood mutational/epigenetic markers.
Biomarker signal reflects disease progression. Biomarkers enable stratification of fecal samples across disease progression, from controls (no lesion) to advanced colorectal polyps, to CRC, enabling accessible and dynamic platform screening for earlier CRC risk assessment.
Unique approach uncovers both known and novel microbial signatures - Database independent, hypothesis free analysis, unique to this platform, independently reinforces over a decade of CRC association with biofilms containing genotoxic pathogens and oral bacteria, while adding capability enabling discovery and inclusion of previously uncharacterized bacteria with strong CRC association.
Early microbial signals may inform novel therapeutic intervention strategies. Detection of CRC-related bacteria in precancer suggests new opportunities for monitoring early intervention and risk reduction strategies at the microbial biofilm stage.