The Impact of Long-term Exposure to Low Levels of Inorganic Arsenic on the Hypomethylation of SEPT9 Promoter in Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transformed Colorectal Cancer Cell Lines

Inorganic arsenicals are worldwide environmental contaminants that affect molecular characteristics in biological systems and lead to genomic and epigenomic instability as well as epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT). In this study, we aimed to investigate whether low levels of sodium arsenite (iAsIII) can influence EMT and genomic instability through microsatellite analysis. We have also determined epigenomic instability by investigating the methylation status of SEPT9 tumor marker in colorectal cancer (CRC) cell lines, Caco2 and HCT116, which were treated with iAsIII to assess IC50s. Short-term and long-term exposure to low concentrations (1 µM and 0.1 µM) of iAsIII in two separate experiments was implemented to analyze EMT, microsatellite status and the methylation pattern of SEPT9 promoter. As expected, after 20 days of exposure to iAsIII, the expression of CDH1 was significantly decreased while the expression of CDH2, FIB1 and VIM was increased in Caco2 and HCT116, a finding that confirmed EMT induction. However, there was no detectable alteration in the size of microsatellites. As for the methylation pattern, SEPT9 promoter was hypomethylated as a result of long-term exposure to 0.1 µM iAsIII in Caco2. Long-term exposure of HCT116 to both concentrations could induce hypomethylation of SEPT9 promoter. Our findings indicate no linkage between EMT induction and microsatellite status in iAsIII-treated CRC cell lines. For the first time, the current study has shown that the induction of EMT by iAsIII is linked with SEPT9 promoter hypomethylation in Caco2 and HCT116 in a concentration- and time-dependent pattern.