MLL: exploring the methylome.

摘要

In this issue of Blood, Schafer and colleagues report their findings on MLL-r infant ALL. They examined global promoter methylation in infants and found hyper-methylation in cases with MLL-r ALL compared with both the normal and non-MLL-r ALL cases. When treating MLL-r cell lines with decitabine, they observed a reexpression of silenced genes and a cytotoxic effect. This may open up the prospect of new treatment options for a disease entity with a dismal prognosis.