肿瘤发生的表观遗传学:进展与临床意义

Epigenetics in tumorigenesis:advances and clinical implications

表观遗传（epigenetics）指所有不通过DNA序列改变就能影响基因表达（从而决定细胞乃至个体表型）的、可遗传的（即可伴随细胞分裂传递下去）调控方式,包括DNA甲基化、组蛋白修饰、染色质重塑、miRNA、朊病毒等。表观遗传调控在干细胞自我更新、定向分化、器官发育等生命过程中起着至关重要的作用：

Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide and the total number of cases globally keeps increasing.For many years,cancer has been thought to be caused by a series of DNA sequence alterations and thus is thought to be a ＂genetic＂disease.However,studies in the last decade,including the large-scale cancer genomics projects,have highlighted the rising importance of epigenetic regulation in cancer.Here,we review recent advances in understanding how chromatin-based epigenetic regulation participates in tumorigenesis and discuss the growing implications of these advances for developing novel strategies to prevent,diagnose,as well as treat cancer.