Genome‐wide DNA methylation profiling of CpG islands in a morpholino anthracycline derivative‐resistant leukemia cell line: p38α as a novel candidate for resistance

Effective leukemia treatment is seriously hampered by drug resistance. We previously showed that aberrant methylation of the topoisomerase II α gene causes altered gene expression and acquired drug resistance in etoposide‐resistant leukemia cells. In this study, we analyzed the genome‐wide methylation status in resistant leukemia cells. We used MX2, which is a morpholino anthracycline derivative that functions as a topoisomerase II α inhibitor. We established a human myelogenous leukemia cell line (K562/P) and a related cell line with resistance to MX2 (K562/MX2). Using these cell lines, we investigated the genome‐wide methylation status, compared expression profiles with a microarray, and analyzed the data using Gene Ontology and key node analysis. We demonstrate that the MX2‐resistant cell line was globally hypermethylated. Gene Ontology analysis identified genes involved in the immunological response and gene silencing that were responsible for methylation‐related altered gene expression in drug‐resistant cells. Key node analysis showed that p38α mitogen‐activated protein kinase was a novel enzyme involved in MX2‐related resistance. p38 kinase activity in resistant cells was increased compared to MX2‐sensitive parent cells. Blocking p38α activity using inhibitors and p38α knock down with small interfering RNA restored the sensitivity to MX2 in resistant cells with a decrease in p38 kinase activity as well as decreased expression of p38α mRNA and phosphorylated p38α protein. These findings may lead to a new strategy for treatment of drug‐resistant leukemia cells.