The epithelial splicing regulator ESRP2 is epigenetically repressed by DNA hypermethylation in Wilms tumour and acts as a tumour suppressor.

ABSTRACT: Wilms tumour (WT), an embryonal kidney cancer, has been extensively characterised for genetic and epigenetic alterations, but a proportion of WTs still lack identifiable abnormalities. To uncover DNA methylation changes critical for WT pathogenesis, we compared the epigenome of foetal kidney with two WT cell lines, filtering our results to remove common cancer-associated epigenetic changes and to enrich for genes involved in early kidney development. This identified four hypermethylated genes, of which ESRP2 (epithelial splicing regulatory protein 2) was the most promising for further study. ESRP2 was commonly repressed by DNA methylation in WT, and this occurred early in WT development (in nephrogenic rests). ESRP2 expression was reactivated by DNA methyltransferase inhibition in WT cell

SUBMITTER: Legge D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8807366 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature