Genome-wide analysis of DNA methylation between nasopharyngeal carcinoma tissues and normal nasopharyngeal epithelial tissues

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is rare malignancy in most parts around the world but common in Southern China and Southeast Asia, Annually, approximately 80,000 new NPC cases and 50,000 deaths are reported worldwide. In NPC, recent advances have shown that many genes that are predominantly or even exclusively silenced by DNA methylation in epithelial cells during pathogenesis of NPC. However, the causal relationship between DNA methylation status and outcome in NPC remains not well understood. To investigate this problem, we used Illumina 450K BeadChips to examined methylation patterns and survival in NPC. and ultimately provided insight into prognostic value of DNA methylation in NPC clinical management. We employed Illumina Human Methylation450K Beadchip to analyze a genome-wide of DNA methylation in a cohort of 48 samples (between 24 nasopharyngeal carcinoma tissues and 24 normal nasopharyngeal epithelial tissues) to identify aberrant methylation genes.