www.impactjournals.com/oncotarget/ Oncotarget, Vol. 7, No. 10 Polycomb repressor complex 1 promotes gene silencing through H2AK119 mono-ubiquitination in acinar-to-ductal metaplasia and pancreatic cancer cells Simone Benitz1,*, Ivonne Regel1,3,*, Tobias Reinhard1, Anna Popp1, Isabell Schäffer1, Susanne Raulefs1, Bo Kong1, Irene Esposito3, Christoph W. Michalski2,*, Jörg Kleeff1,4,5,* 1Department of Surgery, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany 2Department of Surgery, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany 3Institute of Pathology, Heinrich-Heine University, Duesseldorf, Germany 4The Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals, Liverpool, United Kingdom 5Department of Surgery, Heinrich-Heine University, Duesseldorf, Germany *These authors contribute equally to the manuscript. Correspondence to: Ivonne Regel, e-mail:
[email protected] Keywords: polycomb repressor complex, histone mono-ubiquitination, pancreatic cancer, differentiation gene silencing Abbreviations: ADM (acinar-to-ductal metaplasia), PDAC (pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma), PRC (polycomb repressor complex), PTF (pancreas specific transcription factor) Received: July 29, 2015 Accepted: November 16, 2015 Published: December 22, 2015 ABSTRACT Acinar-to-ductal metaplasia (ADM) occurring in cerulein-mediated pancreatitis or in oncogenic Kras-driven pancreatic cancer development is accompanied by extensive changes in the transcriptional program. In this process, acinar cells shut down the expression of acinar specific differentiation genes