Chromatin regulators with tumor suppressor properties and their alterations in human cancers.

Key components of the cell epigenome include DNA CpG methylation profile and chromatin modification patterns. Chromatin regulators act as master controllers of gene transcription in normal cells through regulation of histone modifications and chromatin remodeling. During human cancer pathogenesis, the functions of chromatin regulators are frequently disrupted by genetic mutations and/or epigenetic alterations, causing perturbation of broad or even genome-wide scale gene-expression profiles. Thus, histone-modifying and chromatin-remodeling genes can be taken as critical 'cancer genes'. This review summarizes the current knowledge on chromatin regulators with tumor suppressor properties, as well as their aberrant alterations in human cancers.