Significant association of PRMT 6 hypomethylation with colorectal cancer

Background Protein arginine N‐methyltransferase 6 ( PRMT 6) was deemed to be indispensable in the variety of biological processes. Upregulated PRMT 6 was found in various human diseases including cancer. Herein, we investigated the performance of PRMT 6 methylation in the diagnosis for CRC . Methods A quantitative methylation‐specific polymerase chain reaction ( qMSP ) method was used to measure PRMT 6 promoter methylation. The percentage of methylated reference ( PMR ) was applied to represent gene methylation level. Results Our data indicated that PRMT 6 promoter methylation levels were significantly lower in CRC tissues than those in paired nontumor tissues (median PMR : 36.93% vs 63.12%, P  =   1E‐6) and normal intestinal tissues (median PMR : 36.93% vs 506.55%, P  =   8E‐12). We further examined the potential role of PRMT 6 hypomethylation by the receiver operating characteristic ( ROC ) curve. Our results showed that the area under the curve ( AUC ) was 0.644 (95% CI = 0.596‐0.733) between CRC tissues and paired nontumor tissues, 0.958 (95% CI = 0.919‐0.998) between CRC tissues and normal intestinal tissues, and 0.899 (95% CI = 0.825‐0.972) between paired nontumor tissues and normal intestinal tissues. Conclusion Our study firstly indicated that the hypomethylation of PRMT 6 promoter could be a novel diagnostic biomarker for CRC .