Pervasive transcription read-through promotes aberrant expression of oncogenes and RNA chimeras in renal carcinoma.

ABSTRACT: Aberrant expression of cancer genes and non-canonical RNA species is a hallmark of cancer. However, the mechanisms driving such atypical gene expression programs are incompletely understood. Here, our transcriptional profiling of a cohort of 50 primary clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) samples from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) reveals that transcription read-through beyond the termination site is a source of transcriptome diversity in cancer cells. Amongst the genes most frequently mutated in ccRCC, we identified SETD2 inactivation as a potent enhancer of transcription read-through. We further show that invasion of neighbouring genes and generation of RNA chimeras are functional outcomes of transcription read-through. We identified the BCL2 oncogene as one of such invaded genes and

SUBMITTER: Grosso AR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4744188 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature