The Vision Center at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 2 USC Roski Eye Institute, Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA3 The Saban Research Institute, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA Purpose: Gene expression profiling (GEP) has been clinically validated for stratifying uveal melanoma (UM) patients into two prognostic classes: class 1 (low metastatic risk) and class 2 (high metastatic risk). However, performing GEP analysis requires an intraocular tumor biopsy, which may be limited by tumor heterogeneity and accessibility of the tumor tissue. As a less invasive alternative, specifically the eye-specific aqueous humor (AH) liquid biopsy, has emerged. Previous research in our lab has identified UM-specific differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) from AH that could be used to differentiate GEP classes. In this study, we aim to verify these results and develop a scoring system using a UM-specific DEP signature for predicting metastatic potential.

Liya Xu received her PhD in Neuroscience from University of Southern California 2010. Subsequently, she joined Biomedical Pioneering Innovation Center (BIOPIC) of Peking University to lead the development of one-step next generation sequencing (NGS) based Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) for simultaneous avoidance of monogenic disease and chromosome abnormality. Since 2017, her collaboration with Dr. Jesse Berry has been focusing on developing aqueous humor (AH) as a surrogate tumor biopsy for retinoblastoma (RB). It holds the potential to unlock a new era of precision medicine that will transform the way to detect RB, guide the management and prognosis for RB and lead to alternative treatment regimens that offer a personalized approach to medicine for these children with a greater chance of saving the eye.