ANGI-09. UNRAVELING THE INVOLVEMENT OF BAIAP2 AND CDC42 IN MEDULLOBLASTOMA PATHOGENESIS

The most common malignant pediatric brain tumor is medulloblastoma. Despite advancements in treatment, medulloblastoma survivors have significant long-term medical side effects and increased all-cause mortality. That is why novel, more effective, and safe treatments are direly necessary. One treatment challenge is that medulloblastoma tumors can disseminate via the bloodstream and cerebrospinal fluid leading to a poorer prognosis. The underlying mechanisms that promote metastasis and invasion in medulloblastoma are not clearly understood. One method we used to identify potential key regulators in the pathogenesis of medulloblastoma is by analyzing microarray and single-cell RNA sequencing data. We mined publicly-available datasets along with our data from genetically engineered models of medulloblastoma to identify differentially expressed genes compared to non-tumor brain cells. We identified BAIAP2 and CDC42 to be differentially expressed and have higher expression in medulloblastoma compared to other brain cancers. BAIAP2 and CDC42 are known to be implicated in migration and invasion. Extensive literature demonstrates an interaction between BAIAP2 and CDC42 in multiple cell types. However, this interaction has yet to be thoroughly studied in medulloblastoma. We hypothesize that CDC42 interacts with BAIAP2 in medulloblastoma cells to facilitate tumor pathogenesis. To further investigate this, we conducted siRNA-mediated gene knockdown of BAIAP2 and CDC42 in ONS-76 cells. We determined that BAIAP2 and CDC42 are highly expressed in medulloblastoma, and knockdown of BAIAP2 modulates CDC42 expression. Further, we determined that cell proliferation and migration were reduced upon BAIAP2 and CDC42 knockdown. Our findings suggest that BAIAP2 and CDC42 have a role in the migration and proliferation of medulloblastoma ONS-76 cells. Altogether, these findings indicate BAIAP2 and CDC42 as possible targets for future studies.