Growth dynamics in naturally progressing chronic lymphocytic leukaemia

[Jm954]

Abstract from Nature, 29/5/19 - Unfortunately the whole article is behind a paywall.

"We used the indolent growth dynamics of chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL) to analyse the growth rates and corresponding genomic patterns of leukaemia cells from 107 patients with CLL, spanning decades-long disease courses.

We found that CLL commonly demonstrates not only exponential expansion but also logistic growth, which is sigmoidal and reaches a certain steady-state level. Each growth pattern was associated with marked differences in genetic composition, the pace of disease progression and the extent of clonal evolution.

In a subset of patients, whose serial samples underwent next-generation sequencing, we found that dynamic changes in the disease course of CLL were shaped by the genetic events that were already present in the early slow-growing stages.

Finally, by analysing the growth rates of subclones compared with their parental clones, we quantified the growth advantage conferred by putative CLL drivers in vivo."

nature.com/articles/s41586-...

Another report on the same paper from Cancer Therapy Advisor states "Another interesting observation made in this study was related to an investigation of the growth dynamics of populations of subclones in these samples compared with their parental clones. One finding was that subclones acquiring additional CLL drivers had a fitness advantage in that they were more likely than the latter to exhibit accelerated growth, thereby demonstrating “ongoing evolution in vivo.”

cancertherapyadvisor.com/ho...

Jackie

[Sushibruno]

Sometimes it's hard for me to understand these articles😳, can someone please put this into simple terms🤔, thanks😊.

[gardening-girl in reply to Sushibruno]

Sushibruno, Scott's answer did get across the main points of the Growth Dynamics paper, but I have just one correction (sorry Scott). Fortunately I do have access to the pdf of the paper and the three types of growth kinetics described are Exponential, Intermediate, and Logistic/Sigmoidal, sigmoidal being a kind of logistic function.

gardening-girl

[Sushibruno in reply to gardening-girl]

Thank you, gardening-girl.

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator]

I take sigmoidal to describe what some of us experience with our lymphocyte count - growing exponentially for a while then flattening out. That's why CLL specialists are unlikely to treat solely on the basis of a fast lymphocyte doubling rate as it may stabilise.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sig...

Neil

[Jm954 Administrator]

Yep and I highlighted the most important take home message - that the drivers for growth and the various genetic clones were all there at the start.

Jackie

[Sushibruno]

Thank you so much Scott, I'm doing well thank you😊.

[gardening-girl]

Hey Scott, I've mostly been hiding out in my weedy garden. Don't worry though, periodically I do crawl out from under the weeds to make sure that you are behaving.

Unfortunately my garden is NOTHING like Heather's gorgeous garden!