Description
Epigenetic activation or inactivation of genes plays a critical role in many important human diseases, especially in cancer. A major mechanism for epigenetic inactivation of the genes is methylation of CpG islands in genome DNA caused by DNA methyltransferases. Histone methyltransferases (HMTs) control or regulate DNA methylation through chromatin-dependent transcription repression or activation. HMTs transfer 1-3 methyl groups from S-adenosyl-L-methionine to the lysine and arginine residues of histone proteins. G9a and polycomb group enzymes such as EZH2 are histone methyltransferases that catalyze methylation of histone H3 at lysine 27 (H3-K27) in mammalian cells. Mono–methylation, a modification enriched at pericentromeric heterochromatin, was observed to be broadly distributed throughout all euchromatic sites and participates in silencing gene expression. Di– and tri-methylations of H3-K27 are the facultative heterochromatin mark which promotes the recruitment of polycomb group proteins for gene silencing. Increased H3-K27 methylation is found to be involved in some pathological processes such as cancer progress. The patterns of H3-K27 methylation can be also changed by inhibition or activation of HMTs. Thus quantitative detection of methyl histone H3-K27 would provide useful information for better understanding epigenetic regulation of gene activation/ repression and for developing HMT-targeted drugs. The Pan- Methyl Histone H3-K27 Quantification Kit (Colorimetric) provides a tool for measuring mono– di– and tri-methylation of histone H3-K27