Downregulation of trimethyl transferase SETD2 promotes migration and proliferation of colorectal cancer cell

Abstract

Objective: To study the effect of histone H3 lysine 36 trimethyl transferase SETD2 on colorectal cancer (CRC) cells and the tumorigenesis. Methods: The expression of SETD2 mRNA and protein decreased in CRC cell HCT116 and SW480 with transference of short hairpin RNA. There were KD group and control group. The expression of histone H3 proteins that are trimethylated on lysine 36 (H3K36me3) was detected, and the migration and proliferation capacity of two CRC cell lines were examined. The effect of SETD2 on tumor growth were observed in nude mice experiment. Results: The expression of H3K36me3 protein reduced in CRC cells following the decrease in expression of SETD2 mRNA and protein. The proliferation and migration in CRC cells increased significantly (P<0.05). H3K36me3 protein expression in tumor tissue of KD groups in nude mice experiment was much lower than that in control group by immunohistochemical staining. Tumorgenesis in KD groups occurred earlier and grew larger in size than those in control group (P<0.01). Conclusions: Downregulation of SETD2 mRNA and protein expression in CRC cells would induce the decrease of H3K36me3 protein expression in tumor tissues with migration and proliferation of tumor cells increased which suggest that SETD2 plays an important role in pathogenesis of CRC.

Keywords

• |setd2|histone h3 proteins that are trimethylated on lysine 36 (h3k36me3)|colorectal cancer|tumorgenesis