Identification of Immune Genes Increasing the Risk of Malignant Brain Tumor 'Glioblastoma'

Seongmo Hospital Seoul Neurosurgery Professor An Seudevan's Research Team
First Study on HLA Gene Polymorphism in East Asian Glioblastoma Patients

Anseudevan, Professor of Neurosurgery at Seoul St. Mary's Hospital.

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Gwan-joo] Domestic medical researchers have identified immune genes that increase the risk of malignant brain tumor ‘glioblastoma.’

The research team led by Professor An Sdeban (corresponding author) and resident Choi Sang-su (first author) from the Department of Neurosurgery at Seoul St. Mary’s Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, analyzed and compared the genomic information of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) immune genes from 80 glioblastoma patients diagnosed at Seoul St. Mary’s Hospital between 2018 and 2019 and 142 normal control subjects. On the 24th, they announced that they identified specific subtypes of HLA genes that increase the risk of glioblastoma occurrence.

Specifically, the frequency of the HLA-C*04:01 gene was found to be up to 2.29 times higher in glioblastoma patients, while the frequencies of HLA-A*26:02, HLA-C*08:01, and HLA-DRB1*08:03 genes were 0.22, 0.29, and 0.32 times, respectively.

Glioblastoma is a representative type of glioma, the most common malignant brain tumor. Even with standard treatments including surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy, the average survival rate is less than two years, making it an almost incurable brain cancer with a poor prognosis. Immuno-oncology drugs have been proposed as a new treatment strategy for glioblastoma, and active research is being conducted to understand the relationship between glioblastoma and the immune system.

Professor An Sdeban said, “This study is the first translational research to present the relationship between immune genes and glioblastoma occurrence in an East Asian population. It is expected to help develop new immuno-oncology drugs by understanding the interaction between the nearly incurable glioblastoma and the immune system.”

The results of this study were recently published in the international academic journal ‘PLOS ONE.’ This research was conducted through a basic research project in the field of science and technology (Creative Challenge Research Foundation Support) led by the Ministry of Education and supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea.

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