Somatic mitochondrial DNA disruptive mutations are modifiers of tumourigenesis that correlate with low genomic instability in pituitary adenomas

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mutations leading to the disruption of respiratory complex I (CI) have been shown to exhibit anti-tumorigenic effects, at variance with those impairing only the function but not the assembly of the complex, which appear to contribute positively to cancer development. Owing to the challenges in the analysis of the multi-copy mitochondrial genome, it is yet to be determined whether tumour-associated mtDNA lesions occur as somatic modifying factors or as germ-line predisposing elements. Here we investigated the whole mitochondrial genome sequence of 20 pituitary adenomas with oncocytic phenotype and identified pathogenic and/or novel mtDNA mutations in 60% of the cases. Using highly sensitive techniques, namely fluorescent PCR and allele-specific locked nucleic acid quantitative PCR, we identified the most likely somatic nature of these mutations in our sample set, since none of the mutations was detected in the corresponding blood tissue of the patients analysed. Furthermore, we have subjected a series of 48 pituitary adenomas to a high-resolution array comparative genomic hybridization analysis, which revealed that CI disruptive mutations, and the oncocytic phenotype, significantly correlate with low number of chromosomal aberrations in the nuclear genome. We conclude that CI disruptive mutations in pituitary adenomas are somatic modifiers of tumorigenesis most likely contributing not only to the development of oncocytic change, but also to a less aggressive tumour phenotype, as indicated by a stable karyotype.