Background: Heritable epigenetic alterations have been proposed as an explanation for familial clustering of melanoma. Here we performed genome-wide DNA methylation analysis on affected family members not carrying pathogenic variants in established melanoma susceptibility genes, compared with healthy volunteers.
Results: All melanoma susceptibility genes showed the absence of epimutations in familial melanoma patients, and no loss of imprinting was detected. Unbiased genome-wide DNA methylation analysis revealed significantly different levels of methylation in single CpG sites. The methylation level differences were small and did not affect reported tumour predisposition genes.
Conclusion: Our results provide no support for heritable epimutations as a cause of familial melanoma.
Keywords: DNA methylation; Epimutation; Familial melanoma; Loss of imprinting.