Recurrent Neoantigens in Colorectal Cancer as Potential Immunotherapy Targets

This study was aimed at investigating the mutations in colorectal cancer (CRC) for recurrent neoantigen identification. A total of 1779 samples with whole exome sequencing (WES) data were obtained from 7 published CRC cohorts. Common HLA genotypes were used to predict the probability of neoantigens at high-frequency mutants in the dataset. Based on the WES data, we not only obtained the most comprehensive CRC mutation landscape so far but also found 1550 mutations which could be identified in at least 5 patients, including KRAS G12D (8%), KRAS G12V (5.8%), PIK3CA E545K (3.5%), PIK3CA H1047R (2.5%), and BMPR2 N583Tfs∗44 (2.8%). These mutations can also be recognized by multiple common HLA molecules in Chinese and TCGA cohort as potential “public” neoantigens. Many of these mutations also have high mutation rates in metastatic pan-cancers, suggesting their value as therapeutic targets in different cancer types. Overall, our analysis provides recurrent neoantigens as potential cancer immunotherapy targets.