Short Abstract: Monica Marie Arroyo obtuvo un bachillerato en ciencias en bioquímica con concentración menor en química de la Universidad de Maine, Orono, y un doctorado en bioquímica, biología molecular y biofísica de la Universidad de Minnesota, Minneapolis. Luego hizo un postdoctorado en biquímica estructural en St Jude Children’s Research Hospital en Memphis. Tiene un Diplomado en Fundamentos de Bioética (144 horas) del Centro de Investigación Social Avanzada en Querétaro, México, así como varias certificaciones en educación virtual de la Universidad de California, Irvine, y la Universidad Central de Florida. Miembro de las prestigiosas sociedades de Honor Phi Kappa Phi y Sigma Xi, actualmente es catedrática asociada en el departamento de química de la PUCPR, Ponce. Del 2015-2019 hizo estancias de investigación en el laboratorio del Dr. Javier de Las Rivas en el Centro de Investigación del Cáncer en la Universidad de Salamanca, España. Monica Marie Arroyo earned a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry with a minor in Chemistry from the University of Maine, Orono, and a PhD in Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, and Biophysics from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. She did a postdoc in Structural Biology at St Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis. She has a Diploma in Fundamentals of Bioethics (144 hours) from the Center for Advanced Social Research in Querétaro, Mexico, as well as several certifications in virtual education from the University of California, Irvine, and the University of Central Florida. Member of the prestigious Honor Societies Phi Kappa Phi and Sigma Xi, she is currently an associate professor in Chemistry at Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico, Ponce. From 2015-2019 she did research stays in the laboratory of Dr. Javier de Las Rivas at the Cancer Research Center at the University of Salamanca, Spain.

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Short Abstract: Claudia Carranza has a PhD in Genetics and Master in Bioethics. She has obtained many awards, as TWAS price for Young Scientists from developing Countries and a Developing Country travel award for presenting a research work at the Annual American Meeting of Human Genetics at Houston 2019. Her research focus in Cancer genetics, hereditary cancer syndromes and genetics of human diseases. She is Pioneer in the Human Genetic Research area in Guatemala and She started the first postgraduate education programs in the Country. She has published twelve international papers and participated with nineteen communications at international meetings.

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Short Abstract: Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most aggressive and common brain cancer in adults with the lowest life expectancy. The current neuro-oncology practice has incorporated as biomarkers to guide diagnosis and design treatment genes involved in key molecular events that drive GBM tumorigenesis. This study summarizes findings describing the significant heterogeneity of GBM at the transcriptional and genomic levels, emphasizing eighteen driver genes with clinical relevance. A pattern fitting the stem cell model for GBM ontogenesis, with an up-regulation profile for MGMT and down-regulation for ATRX, H3F3A, TP53, and EGFR in the mesenchymal subtype, was identified. We also detected overexpression for EGFR, NES, VIM, and TP53 in the classical subtype and for MKi67 and OLIG2 genes in the proneural subtype. A unique distribution of somatic mutations was found for the young and adult population, particularly for genes related to DNA repair and chromatin remodeling, highlighting ATRX, MGMT, and IDH1. Our results revealed that highly lesioned genes undergo differential regulation with particular biological pathways for young patients with dead vital status. This meta-analysis will help delineate future strategies related to the use of those molecular markers for clinical decision-making in the medical routine.

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Short Abstract: Breast cancer is a complex, heterogeneous disease at the phenotypic and molecular level. In particular, the transcriptional regulatory programs are known to be significantly affected and such transcriptional alterations are able to capture some of the heterogeneity of the disease, leading to the emergence of breast cancer molecular subtypes. Recently, it has ben found that network biology approaches to decipher such abnormal gene regulation programs, for instance by means of gene co-expression networks have been able to recapitulate the differences between breast cancer subtypes providing elements to further understand their functional origins and consequences. Network biology approaches may be extended to include other co-expression patterns, like those found between genes and non-coding transcripts such as microRNAs (miRs). As is known, miRs play relevant roles in the establishment of normal and anomalous transcription processes. Commodore miRs (cdre-miRs) have been defined as microRNAs that, based on their connectivity and redundancy in co-expression networks, are potential control elements of biological functions. In this work, we reconstructed miR-gene co-expression networks for each breast cancer molecular subtype from high throughput data in 424 samples from the Cancer Genome Atlas consortium. We identified Commodore miRs in three out of four molecular subtypes. We found that in each subtype, each cdremiR was linked to a different set of associated genes, as well as a different set of associated biological functions. We used a systematic literature validation strategy, and identified that the associated biological functions to these cdremiRs are hallmarks of cancer such as angiogenesis, cell adhesion, cell cycle and regulation of apoptosis. The relevance of such cdre-miRs as actionable molecular targets in breast cancer is still to be determined from functional studies.

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