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Nucleic Acids Res 2020 04;48(7):3761-3775

Department of Biochemistry, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA.

We have previously shown that the highly prevalent acute myeloid leukemia (AML) mutation, Arg882His, in DNMT3A disrupts its cooperative mechanism and leads to reduced enzymatic activity, thus explaining the genomic hypomethylation in AML cells. However, the underlying cause of the oncogenic effect of Arg882His in DNMT3A is not fully understood. Here, we discovered that DNMT3A WT enzyme under conditions that favor non-cooperative kinetic mechanism as well as DNMT3A Arg882His variant acquire CpG flanking sequence preference akin to that of DNMT3B, which is non-cooperative. Read More

Am J Med Genet A 2020 04 21;182(4):673-680. Epub 2020 Jan 21.

Department of Genetics, Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

Tatton-Brown Rahman syndrome (TBRS) is an overgrowth-intellectual disability syndrome caused by heterozygous variants in DNMT3A. Seventy-eight individuals have been reported with a consistent phenotype of somatic overgrowth, mild to moderate intellectual disability, and similar dysmorphisms. We present six individuals with TBRS, including the youngest individual thus far reported, first individual to be diagnosed with tumor testing and two individuals with variants at the Arg882 domain, bringing the total number of reported cases to 82. Read More

Neoplasia 2018 11 21;20(11):1106-1120. Epub 2018 Sep 21.

Division of Hematology-Oncology, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital at Linkou, Taiwan; Chang Gung University, Taoyuan, Taiwan. Electronic address:

DNA methyltransferase 3A (DNMT3A) is mutated in various myeloid neoplasms including acute myeloid leukemia (AML), especially at the Arg882 and associated with inferior outcomes. Here, we report that the DNMT3A-Arg882His/Cys (R882H/C) mutations led to inactivation of apoptosis through DNA damage signaling following the impairment of differentiation of myeloid leukemia cells. Gene expression profiling analysis revealed aberrant expression of several cell-cycle and apoptosis-related genes, and the DNA methylation assay identified both hypo- and hypermethylation features in different regions throughout the whole genome of DNMT3A mutants-transduced myeloid cells. Read More

Am J Med Genet A 2017 Jan 7;173(1):250-253. Epub 2016 Nov 7.

Center for Medical Genetics, Keio University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan.

DNA methylation plays a critical role in both embryonic development and tumorigenesis and is mediated through various DNA methyltransferases. Constitutional mutations in the de novo DNA methyltransferase DNMT3A cause a recently identified Tatton-Brown-Rahman overgrowth syndrome (TBRS). Somatically acquired mutations in DNMT3A are causally associated with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), and p. Read More

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2014 Feb 4;111(7):2620-5. Epub 2014 Feb 4.

State Key Laboratory of Medical Genomics, Shanghai Institute of Hematology, Rui Jin Hospital affiliated with Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai 200025, China.

The gene encoding DNA methyltransferase 3A (DNMT3A) is mutated in ∼20% of acute myeloid leukemia cases, with Arg882 (R882) as the hotspot. Here, we addressed the transformation ability of the DNMT3A-Arg882His (R882H) mutant by using a retroviral transduction and bone marrow transplantation (BMT) approach and found that the mutant gene can induce aberrant proliferation of hematopoietic stem/progenitor cells. At 12 mo post-BMT, all mice developed chronic myelomonocytic leukemia with thrombocytosis. Read More