Identification of predictive epigenetic biomarkers in breast cancer

Project leader: Ivana Fridrichová
Project duration: 2011 - 2014

Breast cancer is the most common malignancy in women that represents 28.9% of all cases. Human cancers are driven by progressive genetic changes and epigenetic abnormalities including hyper- and hypomethylation of DNA, and changed patterns of histone modification, with resultant remodeling of the chromatin structure that cause deregulation of the transcription activity of many genes. The recent studies shown that DNA methylation measurement of the specific gene promoters have an important potential to improve an early detection of cancer, and also prediction of prognosis and therapy response. In present study we will evaluate DNA methylation in 11 genes for growth, invasivity and metastasis regulation (ESR1, PGR, RASSF1A, SOCS1, SYK, APC, CDH1, TIMP3, ADAM23, CXCL12 and BRMS1) by using new quantitative method – pyrosequencing. Those methylation profiles, which will be associated with inhibition of protein expression, will be correlated with several clinico-pathological parameters. Determination of significant relation between DNA methylation level and the breast cancer aggressivity degree can lead to the identification of new predictive epigenetic biomarkers for this disease.

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