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Updated: Jun 24, 2025

Characterization of Functionally Associated miRNAs in Glioblastoma and their Engineering into Artificial Clusters for Gene Therapy
Published on: October 4, 2019
Lineage specification in glioblastoma is regulated by METTL7B
Myrianni Constantinou1, James Nicholson1, Xinyu Zhang1
1Brain Tumour Research Centre, Blizard Institute, Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, Queen Mary University London, London, UK.
Abstract:
Glioblastomas are the most common malignant brain tumors in adults; they are highly aggressive and heterogeneous and show a high degree of plasticity. Here, we show that methyltransferase-like 7B (METTL7B) is an essential regulator of lineage specification in glioblastoma, with an impact on both tumor size and invasiveness. Single-cell transcriptomic analysis of these tumors and of cerebral organoids derived from expanded potential stem cells overexpressing METTL7B reveal a regulatory role for the gene in the neural stem cell-to-astrocyte differentiation trajectory. Mechanistically, METTL7B downregulates the expression of key neuronal differentiation players, including SALL2, via post-translational modifications of histone marks.
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