Epigenetic modifications in urooncology

Epigenetics including small, noncoding RNAs, DNA modifications and histone modifications is heritable changes in gene expression. It refers to functional modifications of the genome, but does not involve any changes in the nucleotide sequence. Cancer is the uncontrolled growth of abnormal cells in the body. Both genetic and epigenetic alterations play a key role in cancer development. Epigenetic modifications influence gene silencing, which is important virtually for all steps in carcinogenesis including cancer initiation, progression, invasion and metastatis. Epigenetic modifications as molecular markers are being extensively explored for cancer risk evaluation, early detection, prognosis stratification, and treatment response prediction in urooncology, including prostate, bladder, renal, ovarian and endometrial cancers. Due to epigenetic alterations are pharmacologically reversible, which makes them an attractive target in cancer therapeutics. For cancer screening and detection, tumor methylation biomarkers are useable at predicting prognosis via the assessment of markers in body fluids such as ascites, serum or plasma. In this chapter, we discuss the main epigenetic changes related to carcinogenesis and urogenital cancer biomarkers. © 2013 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved