These results indicate that PRMT5 governs expression of prosurvival genes by promoting WNT/β-CATENIN and AKT/GSK3β proliferative signaling and that its inhibition induces lymphoma cell death, which warrants further clinical evaluation.
Protein arginine methyltransferase 5 (PRMT5) is overexpressed in many cancer types and is a promising therapeutic target for several of them, including leukemia and lymphoma.
PRMT5 is ubiquitously expressed in most tissues and its expression has been shown to be elevated in several cancers including breast cancer, gastric cancer, glioblastoma, and lymphoma.
The expression of one of the nine mammalian PRMTs, PRMT5, affects the levels of symmetric dimethylarginine (SDMA) at Arg-3 on histone H4, leading to the repression of genes which are related to disease progression in lymphoma and leukemia.
The requisite role for PRMT5 in the context of multiple lymphoma/leukemia oncogenic drivers suggests a molecular rationale for therapeutic development.
These findings indicate that PRMT5 is a master epigenetic regulator that governs expression of its own target genes and those regulated by PRC2 and that its inhibition could offer a promising therapeutic strategy for lymphoma patients.