MUSTARD-a comprehensive resource of mutation-specific therapies in cancer

Abstract

The steady increase in global cancer burden has fuelled the development of several modes of treatment for the disease. In the presence of an actionable mutation, targeted therapies offer a method to selectively attack cancer cells, increasing overall efficacy and reducing harmful side effects. However, different drug molecules are in different stages of development, with new molecules obtaining approvals from regulatory agencies each year. To augment clinical impact, it is important that this information reaches clinicians, patients and researchers swiftly and in a structured, well-annotated manner. To this end, we have developed Mutation-Specific Therapies Resource and Database in Cancer (MUSTARD), a database that is designed to be a centralized resource with diverse information such as cancer subtype, associated mutations, therapy offered and its effect observed, along with links to external resources for a more comprehensive annotation. In its current version, MUSTARD comprises over 2105 unique entries, including associations between 418 unique drug therapies, 189 cancer subtypes and 167 genes curated and annotated from over 862 different publications. To the best of our knowledge, it is the only resource that offers comprehensive information on mutation-specific, gene fusions and overexpressed gene-targeted therapies for cancer. Database URL: http://clingen.igib.res.in/mustard/.

Figure 1.

Summary of the data collection and quality control (QC) for the data for mutation-specific therapies in cancer.

Figure 2.

Heatmap depicting the genomic variant and therapy combinations studied for different types of cancer.

Figure 3.

Pie chart depicting the breakdown of types of studies reported in the database.

Figure 4.

MUSTARD homepage showcasing the different search query formats that can be used.

Figure 5.

Screenshot of the MUSTARD database showing the expanded search results.

Figure 6.

The breakdown of the 50 unique variants overlapping between the patient dataset and MUSTARD, according to their stage of study as per the database annotations.

Figure 7.

Summary of the breakdown of each of the 50 unique variants across the 11 studies. The variants highlighted in blue represent molecules that have been FDA approved, while green represents guidelines as well as FDA approved molecules. Note: LA—Lung adenocarcinoma, NSCLC—non-small cell lung cancer, PLC—pan-lung cancer, LSCC—lung squamous cell carcinoma, LCNC—large cell neuroendocrine carcinoma, LAC—lung adenosquamous carcinoma.