Sorafenib induces variations of the DNA methylome in HA22T/VGH human hepatocellular carcinoma-derived cells

Int J Oncol. 2017 Jul;51(1):128-144. doi: 10.3892/ijo.2017.4019. Epub 2017 May 24.

Abstract

Sorafenib is currently used to treat advanced and/or unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but the increase of the median survival was only 3 months. Moreover, sorafenib has severe side effects and patients develop resistance quickly. Epigenetic alterations such as DNA methylation play a decisive role in the development and progression of HCC. To our knowledge, there are no studies that analysed the global DNA methylation changes in HCC cells treated with sorafenib. Using MeDip-chip technologies, we found 1230 differentially methylated genes in HA22T/VGH cells treated with sorafenib compared to untreated cells. Gene ontology and pathway analysis allowed identifying several enriched signaling pathways involved in tumorigenesis and cancer progression. Among the genes differentially methylated we found genes related to apoptosis, angiogenesis and invasion, and genes belonging to pathways known to be deregulated in HCC such as RAF/MEK/ERK, JAK-STAT, PI3K/AKT/mTOR and NF-κB. Generally, we found that oncogenes tended to be hypermethylated and the tumor suppressor genes tended to be hypomethylated after sorafenib treatment. Finally, we validated MeDip-chip results for several genes found differentially methylated such as BIRC3, FOXO3, MAPK3, SMAD2 and TSC2, using both COBRA assay and direct bisulfite sequencing and we evaluated their mRNA expression. Our findings suggest that sorafenib could affect the methylation level of genes associated to cancer-related processes and pathways in HCC cells, some of which have been previously described to be directly targeted by sorafenib.

MeSH terms

  • Antineoplastic Agents / pharmacology*
  • Biomarkers, Tumor / genetics*
  • Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / drug therapy
  • Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / genetics*
  • Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / pathology
  • DNA Methylation / drug effects*
  • Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic / drug effects*
  • Humans
  • Liver Neoplasms / drug therapy
  • Liver Neoplasms / genetics*
  • Liver Neoplasms / pathology
  • Niacinamide / analogs & derivatives*
  • Niacinamide / pharmacology
  • Phenylurea Compounds / pharmacology*
  • Promoter Regions, Genetic / genetics
  • Signal Transduction
  • Sorafenib
  • Tumor Cells, Cultured

Substances

  • Antineoplastic Agents
  • Biomarkers, Tumor
  • Phenylurea Compounds
  • Niacinamide
  • Sorafenib