Single-cell imaging reveals unexpected heterogeneity of telomerase reverse transcriptase expression across human cancer cell lines.

ABSTRACT: Telomerase is pathologically reactivated in most human cancers, where it maintains chromosomal telomeres and allows immortalization. Because telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) is usually the limiting component for telomerase activation, numerous studies have measured TERT mRNA levels in populations of cells or in tissues. In comparison, little is known about TERT expression at the single-cell and single-molecule level. To address this, we analyzed TERT expression across 10 human cancer lines using single-molecule RNA fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) and made several unexpected findings. First, there was substantial cell-to-cell variation in number of transcription sites and ratio of transcription sites to gene copies. Second, previous classification of lines as having monoalle

SUBMITTER: Rowland TJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6744858 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature