ArticleThe American journal of pathology2011
Prevalence of the alternative lengthening of telomeres telomere maintenance mechanism in human cancer subtypes.
Article in The American journal of pathology, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 338 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
338 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 517 citations in OpenAlex.
- Telomerase activity, TERT expression, hTERT promoter alterations, and alternative lengthening of the telomeres (ALT) in meningiomas - a systematic review.Neurosurgical review · 2020Pooled it
- Frequency and Clinical Significance of Clonal and Subclonal Driver Mutations in High-Risk Neuroblastoma at Diagnosis: A Children's Oncology Group Study.Journal of clinical oncology : official journal of the American Society of Clinical Oncology · 2025Trial
- Virotherapy for Spinal and Spinal Cord Tumors: Current Evidence and Future Perspectives.Microorganisms · 2026Review
- Fibrosarcoma of bone masquerading as fibrous dysplasia: diagnostic pitfall and molecular correlates of aggressive behavior.Journal of pathology and translational medicine · 2026Article
- Twisting the End Game: How Telomere Chromatin Modifications Shape Telomere Maintenance.Aging cell · 2026Review
- Patient-partnered multiomics reveals the molecular architecture of angiosarcoma.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Multi-omics characterization of IDH-mutant astrocytoma-derived cell lines reveals NOTCH-regulated plastic quiescent astrocyte-like state and insights into progression.Acta neuropathologica communications · 2026Article
- Frequency and Prognostic Significance of Genetic Abnormalities in a Subgroup of Patients With Intermediate-Risk Neuroblastoma: A SIOPEN Study.JCO precision oncology · 2026Article
- Distinct Malignant Cell States and Myeloid Glutamate Signaling Associated with Aggressive Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Tumors.Clinical cancer research : an official journal of the American Association for Cancer Research · 2026Article
- Complex structural variations functionally inactivate the telomerase chaperone TCAB1 in osteosarcoma.BMC cancer · 2026Article
- Telomeric DNA-Promyelocytic Leukemia (TEL-PML) Colocalization as an ALT Proxy in Relation to Metastatic Behavior in Osteosarcoma: A Retrospective Cohort Study.Current issues in molecular biology · 2026Article
- Telomere maintenance mechanisms are activated in ganglioneuroblastoma and ganglioneuroma.Oncology letters · 2026Article
- Chromosome-arm-specific telomere length governs dual modes of structural genome evolution in IDH-mutant astrocytoma.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- SMARCAL1 is a targetable synthetic lethal therapeutic vulnerability in ATRX-deficient gliomas that use alternative lengthening of telomeres.Neuro-oncology · 2026Article
- ATRX loss in sarcomas is associated with dysregulated gene and transposable element expression, loss of DNA methylation, and worse survival.ESMO rare cancers · 2026Article
- Targeting Telomerase in Cancer: Vaccine-Based Strategies, Clinical Evidence, and Synergy with Immunotherapy.Diseases (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Article
- Large-scale drug sensitivity, gene dependency, and proteogenomic analyses of telomere maintenance mechanisms in cancer cells.Nature communications · 2025Article
- The chromatin guardian ATRX is a strong prognostic biomarker in melanoma.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Decoding osteosarcoma from heterogeneity to precision therapy.Discover oncology · 2025Review
278 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
25 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Approximately 10% to 15% of human cancers lack detectable telomerase activity, and a subset of these maintain telomere lengths by the telomerase-independent telomere maintenance mechanism termed alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT). The ALT phenotype, relatively common in subtypes of sarcomas and astrocytomas, has rarely been reported in epithelial malignancies. However, the prevalence of ALT has not been thoroughly assessed across all cancer types. We therefore comprehensively surveyed the ALT phenotype in a broad range of human cancers. In total, two independent sets comprising 6110 primary tumors from 94 different cancer subtypes, 541 benign neoplasms, and 264 normal tissue samples were assessed by combined telomere-specific fluorescence in situ hybridization and immunofluorescence labeling for PML protein. Overall, ALT was observed in 3.73% (228/6110) of all tumor specimens, but was not observed in benign neoplasms or normal tissues. This is the first report of ALT in carcinomas arising from the bladder, cervix, endometrium, esophagus, gallbladder, kidney, liver, and lung. Additionally, this is the first report of ALT in medulloblastomas, oligodendrogliomas, meningiomas, schwannomas, and pediatric glioblastoma multiformes. Previous studies have shown associations between ALT status and prognosis in some tumor types; thus, further studies are warranted to assess the potential prognostic significance and unique biology of ALT-positive tumors. These findings may have therapeutic consequences, because ALT-positive cancers are predicted to be resistant to anti-telomerase therapies.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.