Hechuan team new results! The successful mapping of key 5hmC biomarkers promises to improve the diagnosis of cancer in humans

5, 2020 // -- In a recent study published in the international journal Nature Communications, scientists from the University of Chicago and others developed a genome-wide 5-hydroxymethyl cytosine (5hmC) map covering multiple types of human tissue, revealing the powerful properties of 5hmC as a universal biomarker that can detect a variety of serious human diseases, such as cancer and many chronic diseases.
Unlike gene suppression marker 5mC, 5hmC is a special gene activation marker that represents one of the most popular ways to participate in embryonic regulation, neural processes, and carcinogenic processes, and this new mapping may help scientists understand the multiple biological drivers that induce multiple diseases, which is important for the development of a new generation of diagnostic test reagents.
Photo Source: CC0 Public Domain researcher Professor Chuan He says previous studies have shown that 5hmC may be an excellent biomarker for diagnosis and prognostic assessment of a variety of human diseases, including cancer, but the lack of a map of whole-body tissue may limit our overall understanding of the marker and its potential tissue specificity.
Through a joint study, this study expands our understanding of global biomarkers, and it is also the most extensive map of human tissue modified by 5hmC, which confirms that 5hmC may be a universal genetic activation marker for gene bodies and enhancer, with very good tissue and cell type specificity, and may be critical to improving early diagnosis of cancer in humans and monitoring of chronic diseases in humans in the future. in the
study, researchers assessed the performance and repeatability of 5hmC as a biomarker in 19 tissue types in multiple organs in both men and women, and found that the 5hmC characteristics identified in the new map could provide an unprecedented database for potential diagnostic technology development, especially in cancer research.
The map is based on the study of 96 samples representing 10 major organ systems in the body, including the nervous system, cardiovascular system, digestive system and reproductive system, and is also the most comprehensive analysis of 5hmC as a biomarker for cancer detection.
Based on previous research, the researchers highlighted that 5hmC may be able to explain known biological characteristics in human tissue by determining gene transcription and gene regulation activity in the same experiment, while the researchers' new map depicts the genome distribution characteristics of 5hmC from 19 tissue types of 10 human organs, laying a solid foundation for the development of new diagnostic testing techniques in the future.
Finally, researcher Dr Samuel Levy points out that the mapping may further help us to improve the ability to detect and interpret cancer signals in tumor tissue from cellless DNA with the ultimate goal of developing powerful cancer screening techniques, and that the work will provide new clues and ideas for later scientists to further study by using 5hmC to gain an in-depth understanding of biological mechanisms.
() Original source: Cui, XL., Nie, J., Ku, J. et al. A human tissue map of 5-hydroxymethylcytosines exhibits tissue specificity through gene and enhancer modulation. Nat Commun 11, 6161 (2020). doi:10.1038/s41467-020-20001-w。