Acute loss of tumor suppressor TET  results in aggressive myeloid cancer

Acute loss of tumor suppressor TET  results in aggressive myeloid cancer

TET-family dioxygenases oxidize 5-methylcytosine (5mC) in DNA, and exert tumor suppressor activity in many types of cancers. Even in the absence of TET coding region mutations, TET loss-of-function is strongly associated with cancer.

Researchers show in the journal Nature Communications that acute elimination of TET function induces the rapid development of an aggressive, fully-penetrant and cell-autonomous myeloid leukaemia in mice, pointing to a causative role for TET loss-of-function in this myeloid malignancy.

Phenotypic and transcriptional profiling shows aberrant differentiation of haematopoietic stem/progenitor cells, impaired erythroid and lymphoid differentiation and strong skewing to the myeloid lineage, with only a mild relation to changes in DNA modification.

They also observe progressive accumulation of phospho-H2AX and strong impairment of DNA damage repair pathways, suggesting a key role for TET proteins in maintaining genome integrity.

http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/151126/ncomms10071/full/ncomms10071.html
 
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