ABSTRACT

Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is a very rare, but highly aggressive skin cancer which occurs mainly in elderly patients. MCC cells show an expression pattern of three cell lineages: epithelial, neuroendocrine, and B-cell progenitor. This trilinear expression pattern suggests stemness activity in MCC. The etiopathogenesis of MCC is either linked to the Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV) or in a smaller proportion (20%) to high levels of UV-induced somatic mutations. Both viral presence and accumulation of mutations have been shown to be associated with accelerated DNA methylation Age (DNAmAge) compared to chronological age. The MCC DNAmAge was significantly lower compared to the chronological age, which was irrespective of the viral presence or mutational burden. Although these features indicate some aspects of stemness in MCC cells, gene-expression-based pluripotency testing did not provide evidence for pluripotency of MCC cells.

摘要

默克尔细胞癌（MCC）是一种非常罕见但高度侵袭性的皮肤癌，主要发生于老年患者。MCC细胞显示三种细胞谱系的表达模式：上皮，神经内分泌和B细胞祖细胞。这种三线性表达模式暗示了MCC中的茎干活性。MCC的病因是与默克尔细胞多瘤病毒（MCPyV）相关，或者与紫外线诱导的体细胞突变的高比例相关（较小比例（20％））。与按时间顺序的年龄相比，病毒的存在和突变的积累均与加速的DNA甲基化年龄（DNAmAge）相关。与病毒性存在或突变负担无关，与时序年龄相比，MCC DNAmAge显着降低。尽管这些特征表明了MCC细胞干性的某些方面，