State Key Laboratory of Ophthalmology, Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.
J Cell Physiol. 2021 Apr;236(4):2318-2332. doi: 10.1002/jcp.30022. Epub 2020 Aug 25.
Retinoblastoma (RB) is a pediatric ocular tumor mostly occurring due to the biallelic loss of RB1 gene in the developing retina. Early studies of genomic aberrations in RB have provided a valuable insight into how RB can progress following the tumor-initiating RB1 mutations and have established a notion that inactivation of RB1 gene is critical to initiate RB but this causative genetic lesion alone is not sufficient for malignant progression. With the advent of high-throughput sequencing technologies, we now have access to the comprehensive genomic and epigenetic landscape of RB and have come to appreciate that RB tumorigenesis requires both genetic and epigenetic alterations that might be directly or indirectly driven by RB1 loss. This integrative perspective on RB tumorigenesis has inspired research efforts to better understand the types and functions of epigenetic mechanisms contributing to RB development, leading to the identification of multiple epigenetic regulators misregulated in RB in recent years. A complete understanding of the intricate network of genetic and epigenetic factors in modulation of gene expression during RB tumorigenesis remains a major challenge but would be crucial to translate these findings into therapeutic interventions. In this review, we will provide an overview of chromatin regulators identified to be misregulated in human RB among the numerous epigenetic factors implicated in RB development. For a subset of these chromatin regulators, recent findings on their functions in RB development and potential therapeutic applications are discussed.
视网膜母细胞瘤(RB)是一种小儿眼部肿瘤,主要由于发育中的视网膜中 RB1 基因的双等位基因缺失而发生。早期对 RB 中基因组异常的研究为了解 RB1 突变后肿瘤如何进展提供了宝贵的见解,并确立了 RB1 基因失活对于启动 RB 至关重要的概念,但这种致病变异本身对于恶性进展还不够。随着高通量测序技术的出现,我们现在可以获得 RB 的全面基因组和表观遗传景观,并开始认识到 RB 肿瘤发生需要遗传和表观遗传改变,这些改变可能直接或间接地由 RB1 缺失驱动。这种对 RB 肿瘤发生的综合观点激发了研究工作,以更好地理解导致 RB 发展的表观遗传机制的类型和功能,近年来已确定了多个在 RB 中失调的表观遗传调节剂。全面了解在 RB 肿瘤发生过程中调节基因表达的遗传和表观遗传因素的复杂网络仍然是一个主要挑战,但将这些发现转化为治疗干预措施至关重要。在这篇综述中,我们将概述在人类 RB 中已确定为失调的染色质调节剂,其中涉及许多与 RB 发展相关的表观遗传因素。对于这些染色质调节剂中的一部分,我们将讨论它们在 RB 发育中的功能及其潜在的治疗应用的最新发现。