Eur J Anat, 22 (4): 303-316 (2018)

DNA methylation patterns as molecular biomarkers: an overview in colorectal cancer

Encarnación González-Flores¹, Rosa Hernández^2,3,4, Pablo J. Ã�lvarez³, Laura Cabeza^2,3,4, Gloria Perazzoli³, Inmaculada Zafra³, Consolación Melguizo^2,3,4, Jose Prados^2,3,4, Ana R. Rama^3,5

¹Service of Medical Oncology, University Hospital Virgen de las Nieves of Granada, Granada, Spain, ²Departament of Anatomy and Embryology, University of Granada, Granada, Spain, ³Institute of Biopathology and Regenerative Medicine (IBIMER), Biomedical Research Center (CIBM), University of Granada, Granada, Spain, ⁴Biosanitary Institute of Granada (ibs GRANADA), SAS -Universidad de Granada, Granada, Spain, ⁵Department of Health Sciences, Univer-sity of Jaen, Jaen, Spain

ABSTRACT DNA methylation patterns may be used as innovative biomarkers for some pathologies including cancer. They show a great accessibility due to their stability and presence in body fluids. In addition, these epigenetic modifications may be used as prognosis markers or therapeutic targets. Concretely, in colorectal cancer (CRC), the third most common cancer in the world in both men and women, a continuous genetic and epigenetic alteration occurs during neoplastic transformation in colonic epithelial cells. This accumulation of alterations leads to the transformation of normal colonic epithelial cells to adenocarcinomas, and these genetic alterations are promoted by aberrant methylation of promoter regions and subsequent gene silencing. Many of these genes have been reported to be methylated in the tissue, plasma and stool of CRC patients, suggesting that they may have great potential to be used as biomarkers for the early detection of CRC. The aim of this study is to review changes in the methylation pattern of the genes that can be used as novel diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers of CRC.

Keywords: Colorectal cancer â?? Biomarkers â?? DNA Methylation â?? Prognosis