Epigenetic Maintenance of Stemness and Malignancy in Peripheral Neuroectodermal Tumors by EZH2
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ABSTRACT: Chromatin modifications are increasingly recognized as a key mechanism in cancer. The histone methyl-transferase Enhancer of Zeste, Drosophila, Homolog 2 (EZH2) is the enzymatic subunit of the polycomb PRC2 complex and methylates histone H3K27, thereby, mediating gene silencing. Down-regulation of EZH2 by RNA interference in ET suppressed oncogenic transformation, tumor development and metastasis in a respective mouse model. Further microarray analysis of EZH2 knock down, or functionally linked HDAC-inhibitor treatment revealed an undifferentiated reversible phenotype in ET maintained by EZH2. EZH2 suppression resulted in a generalized loss of H3K27me3 as well as an increase in H3 acetylation levels. In addition, ChIP-Chip assays for H3K27me3 identified genes that had specifically lost H3K27me3 upon EZH2 silencing. These findings suggested that stemness features are preserved via epigenetic mechanisms. Taken together, the genetic EWS-Fli1 translocation is intimately linked to global and gene specific epigenetic alterations in ET biology. EZH2 mediates neuroectodermal and endothelial embryonal tumor stem cell growth and metastasic spread induced by a translocation derived chimeric transcription factor. Keywords: PNET, Ewing Tumor Epigenetic regulation
ORGANISM(S): Homo sapiens
PROVIDER: GSE15890 | GEO | 2009/06/02
SECONDARY ACCESSION(S): PRJNA117057
REPOSITORIES: GEO
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