Rna-Seq in the Study of Virus-Associated Tumors: Cervical Cancer (Review)

Abstract

For the last few years Next Generation Sequencing technique and its applications has took the leading position in the arsenal of analytical methods that are used for studying the mechanisms of neoplastic progression. Among various experimental opportunities Next Generation Sequencing provides, RNA-sequencing (RNA-Seq) is of great importance as it makes possible unraveling the highest levels of genome expression regulation, which define the molecular phenotype of cells in composition of a tumor. Considerable amount of current studies carried out with the use of RNA-Seq method are designed as pan-cancer integrated research, in which special attention is payed to virus-associated tumors, including papillomavirus-dependent cervical cancer. This review paper summarizes the results of RNA-Seq studies published world-wide within 2017-2019 years and carried out using clinical samples from cervical cancer patients. New facts concerning such hot topics as genomic and transcriptomic instability, neoantigen load, cellular and molecular heterogeneity, tumor epigenetics, antitumor and antiviral immune response, chronic inflammation, immune exhaustion, phenotypic plasticity and tumor cell resistance, are considered. The whole spectrum of issues that are actively discussed in published literature is systematized according to three levels of organization: «molecular», «cellular» and «organismal». The findings reviewed in the paper convincingly illustrate that wide usage of RNA-Seq technology for profiling primary tumors does facilitate moving to a new level of our understanding of the mechanisms of carcinogenesis and emergence of new directions in cancer treatment, namely targeted and immune-therapy.