Chromatin remodeler Smarca5 is required for cancer-related processes of primary cell fitness and immortalization

A new study conducted by scientists at the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), with partners from Charles University in Prague (Czechia), describes new roles of a key chromatin remodelling enzyme, Smarca5, which is often deregulated in human cancers. The study was published in the journal Cells.

The new results show that Smarca5 plays crucial and complex roles in the maintenance of primary cell fitness, including protecting cells from exposure to mutagenic chemicals. Using an innovative genetic ablation and multi-omics profiling strategy, the researchers documented the highly complex molecular and phenotypic programmes dependent on the Smarca5 gene.

The study provides new mechanistic evidence for a link between the cellular levels of Smarca5 and selected hallmarks of cancer that include genome instability, epigenetic reprogramming, evasion of cellular senescence, and cell immortality.

Thakur S, Cahais V, Turkova T, Zikmund T, Renard C, Stopka T, et al.
Chromatin remodeler Smarca5 is required for cancer-related processes of primary cell fitness and immortalization
Cells, Published online 25 February 2022;
https://doi.org/10.3390/cells11050808

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