Quantitative and correlation analysis of the DNA methylation and expression of DAPK in breast cancer

, , , , , , ,
1 Department of Thyroid and Breast Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of FuJian Medical University, FuZhou, China
2 College of Life Sciences, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou, China
DOI
10.7287/peerj.preprints.2568v1
Published
Accepted
Subject Areas
Cell Biology
Keywords
DNA methylation, DAPK, breast cancer, Correlation
Copyright
© 2016 Zhu et al.
Licence
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
Cite this article
Zhu Y, Li S, Wang Q, Chen L, Wu K, Huang Y, Chen X, Lin Y. 2016. Quantitative and correlation analysis of the DNA methylation and expression of DAPK in breast cancer. PeerJ Preprints 4:e2568v1

Abstract

Backgound. Death associated protein kinase 1 (DAPK) is an important tumor suppressor kinase involved in the regulation of multiple cellular activities such as apoptosis and autophagy. DNA methylation of DAPK gene was found in various types of cancers and often correlated with the clinicopathological characteristics. However, the mRNA and protein expression of DAPK in the same sample was rarely measured. Thus it was unclear if the correlation between DAPK gene methylation and clinicopathological parameters was due to the loss of DAPK expression.

Methods. In this study, the DNA methylation rate, mRNA and protein expression of DAPK was quantitatively detected in 15 pairs of breast cancer patient samples including tumor (T) and adjacent non-tumor (N) tissues. Results. The correlation between DNA methylation rate and mRNA expression, together with the correlation between mRNA and protein expression, was calculated. No correlation was observed between any levels using either the measurement value of each sample or the T/N ratio of each pair.

Discussion. These data suggested the DNA methylation status of DAPK did not correlate well with its mRNA or protein expression. Extra caution is needed when interpreting the DNA methylation data of DAPK gene in clinical studies.

Author Comment

Our research suggested the DNA methylation status of DAPK did not correlate well with its mRNA or protein expression. Extra caution is needed when interpreting the DNA methylation data of DAPK gene in clinical studies