Relaxation of onconeural gene transcription control in NRSF deficient primary invasive breast and ovarian gynecological tumors

Negative regulation of many neuronal genes is mediated by the neuron-restrictive silencer factor (NRSF or REST), which binds to a neuron-restrictive silencer element (NRSE) and thereby represses transcription of neuronal genes in non-neuronal cells. The expression of neuronal cell markers in malignant tumors, like small cell lung cancer (SCLC), primary invasive breast cancer, and more rarely in ovarian cancer frequently correlates with paraneoplastic disorders, but also with a higher invasiveness and a poorer prognosis. Recently, NRSF has been postulated as a tumor suppressor gene in the development of cancer. O…