Background:Developmental arrest of fetal germ cells may lead to neoplastic transformation and formation of germ cell tumours via carcinoma in situ (CIS) cells. Normal fetal germ cell development requires complete erasure and re-establishment of DNA methylation. In contrast to normal spermatogonia, the genome of CIS cells remains unmethylated in the adult testis. We here investigated the possible active and passive pathways that can sustain the CIS genome hypomethylated in the adult testis.Methods:The levels of 5-methyl-cytosine (5mC) and 5-hydroxy-methyl-cytosine (5hmC) in DNA from micro-dissected CIS cells were assessed by quantitative measurements. The expression of TET1, TET2, APOBEC1, MBD4, APEX1, PARP1, DNMT1, DNMT3A, DNMT3B and DNMT3L in adult testis specimens with CIS and in human fetal testis was investigated by immunohistochemistry and immunofluorescence.Results:DNA from micro-dissected CIS cells contained very low levels of 5hmC produced by ten eleven translocation (TET) enzymes. CIS cells and fetal germ cells expressed the suggested initiator of active demethylation, APOBEC1, and the base excision repair proteins MBD4, APEX1 and PARP1, whereas TETs – the alternative initiators were absent. Both maintenance and de novo methyltransferases were detected in CIS cells.Conclusion:The data are consistent with the presence of an active DNA de-methylation pathway in CIS cells. The hypomethylated genome of CIS cells may contribute to phenotypic plasticity and invasive capabilities of this testicular cancer precursor.
Foetal development of germ cells is a unique biological process orchestrated by cellular specification, migration and niche development in concert with extensive epigenetic and transcriptional programs. Many of these processes take place early in foetal life and are hence very difficult to study in humans. However, the common precursor of testicular cancers -the carcinoma in situ (CIS) cell -is thought to be an arrested foetal germ cell. Therefore studies of CIS cells may leverage information on human foetal germ cell development and, in particular, when neoplastic transformation is initiated. In this review, we will focus on current knowledge of the epigenetics of CIS cells and relate it to the epigenetic changes occurring in early developing germ cells of mice during specification, migration and colonization. We will focus on DNA methylation and some of the best studied histone modifications like H3K9me2, H3K27me3 and H3K9ac. We also show that CIS cells contain high levels of H3K27ac, which is known to mark active enhancers. Proper epigenetic reprogramming seems to be a pre-requisite of normal foetal germ cell development and we propose that alterations in these programs may be a pathogenic event in the initiation of testicular germ cell cancer. Even though only sparse information is available on epigenetic cues in human foetal germ cells, these indicate that the developmental patterns differ from the findings in mice and emphasize the need for further studies of foetal germ cell development in humans.
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