Characterization of glioblastoma (GBM) vasculature and protein expression of surrounding tumor cells on single FFPE sections with a multicycle multiplexed in situ immunofluorescent staining technology.

2097 Background: GBM is the most common brain tumor in humans and has a dismal prognosis. Although antiangiogenic therapy (bevacizumab) is an option for GBM, there is still unmet need to understand tumor pathophysiology and predictive biomarkers. We built a tissue based multiplexed immunofluorescent assays and developed algorithms to identify and quantify tumor vasculature, that enabled quantification, visualization, and colocalization of multiple protein in surrounding tumor cells at single cell and subcellular levels. This assay provides unique opportunity to explore tumor heterogeneity of tissue morphology and their relationships to vasculature, and is a novel tool for biomarker and treatment discovery. Methods: Tissue micro arrays (TMAs) were constructed from 141 GBM patients. Fluorescent dye labeled antibodies against 18 biomarkers were sequentially applied on single sections of these TMAs. Metrics were built to identify vessels, quantify distance of tumor cells to vessels, and analyze expression pro...