@article {10.3844/amjsp.2013.21.35,
article_type = {journal},
title = {Epigenetic Mechanisms in Hepatitis C Virus-Associated Hepatocellular Carcinoma: A Potential New Link Between Stem Cells, Virology and Cancer},
author = {Feng, Qinghua and Hassan, Sajida and Das, Trina and Huang, Jianfei and Feng, Zhenqing and Gretch, David},
volume = {4},
year = {2013},
month = {Mar},
pages = {21-35},
doi = {10.3844/amjsp.2013.21.35},
url = {https://thescipub.com/abstract/amjsp.2013.21.35},
abstract = {Recent studies suggest that epigenetic mechanisms are not only essential for the dynamic transcriptional regulation in embryonic and somatic stem cells, but are also actively involved in tumorigenesis: genes important for pluripotency are epigenetically regulated and aberrant epigenetic changes have been detected in virtually all human malignancies studied, including Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC). Infection with Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) is a major risk factor for the development of HCC. Despite the fact that HCV is a RNA virus without a DNA intermediate, recent studies demonstrate that HCV viral proteins may actively participate in epigenetic regulation of hepatic cancer stem cell phenotypes and induce HCC-specific epigenetic changes. Identification of host epigenetic alterations induced by HCV infection and epigenetic differences between hepatic cancer stem cells and the bulk non-tumorigenic cancer cells, may yield potential biomarkers for early detection, as well as therapeutic targets for HCV associated HCC.},
journal = {Current Research in Medicine},
publisher = {Science Publications}
}