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Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis

Colorectal cancer (CRC) develops through a multistage process that results from the progressive accumulation of genetic mutations, and frequently as a result of mutations in the Wnt signaling pathway. However, it has become evident over the past two decades that epigenetic alterations of the chromat...

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Autores principales: Bardhan, Kankana, Liu, Kebin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3730326/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24216997
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers5020676
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author Bardhan, Kankana
Liu, Kebin
author_facet Bardhan, Kankana
Liu, Kebin
author_sort Bardhan, Kankana
collection PubMed
description Colorectal cancer (CRC) develops through a multistage process that results from the progressive accumulation of genetic mutations, and frequently as a result of mutations in the Wnt signaling pathway. However, it has become evident over the past two decades that epigenetic alterations of the chromatin, particularly the chromatin components in the promoter regions of tumor suppressors and oncogenes, play key roles in CRC pathogenesis. Epigenetic regulation is organized at multiple levels, involving primarily DNA methylation and selective histone modifications in cancer cells. Assessment of the CRC epigenome has revealed that virtually all CRCs have aberrantly methylated genes and that the average CRC methylome has thousands of abnormally methylated genes. Although relatively less is known about the patterns of specific histone modifications in CRC, selective histone modifications and resultant chromatin conformation have been shown to act, in concert with DNA methylation, to regulate gene expression to mediate CRC pathogenesis. Moreover, it is now clear that not only DNA methylation but also histone modifications are reversible processes. The increased understanding of epigenetic regulation of gene expression in the context of CRC pathogenesis has led to development of epigenetic biomarkers for CRC diagnosis and epigenetic drugs for CRC therapy.
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spelling pubmed-37303262013-08-05 Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis Bardhan, Kankana Liu, Kebin Cancers (Basel) Article Colorectal cancer (CRC) develops through a multistage process that results from the progressive accumulation of genetic mutations, and frequently as a result of mutations in the Wnt signaling pathway. However, it has become evident over the past two decades that epigenetic alterations of the chromatin, particularly the chromatin components in the promoter regions of tumor suppressors and oncogenes, play key roles in CRC pathogenesis. Epigenetic regulation is organized at multiple levels, involving primarily DNA methylation and selective histone modifications in cancer cells. Assessment of the CRC epigenome has revealed that virtually all CRCs have aberrantly methylated genes and that the average CRC methylome has thousands of abnormally methylated genes. Although relatively less is known about the patterns of specific histone modifications in CRC, selective histone modifications and resultant chromatin conformation have been shown to act, in concert with DNA methylation, to regulate gene expression to mediate CRC pathogenesis. Moreover, it is now clear that not only DNA methylation but also histone modifications are reversible processes. The increased understanding of epigenetic regulation of gene expression in the context of CRC pathogenesis has led to development of epigenetic biomarkers for CRC diagnosis and epigenetic drugs for CRC therapy. MDPI 2013-06-05 /pmc/articles/PMC3730326/ /pubmed/24216997 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers5020676 Text en © 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Bardhan, Kankana
Liu, Kebin
Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title_full Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title_fullStr Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title_full_unstemmed Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title_short Epigenetics and Colorectal Cancer Pathogenesis
title_sort epigenetics and colorectal cancer pathogenesis
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3730326/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24216997
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/cancers5020676
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