Checkpoint With Forkhead And Ring Finger Domains Protein (CHFR)

CHFR contains a cysteine-rich region that did not display significant similarity to any protein in the GenBank database, but is highly conserved between humans and mice. Expression of CHFR was precisely correlated with both CpG methylation and deacetylation of histones H3 and H4 in the CpG-rich regulatory region. Cells with CHFR methylation had an intrinsically high mitotic index when treated with microtubule inhibitor. This means that cells in which CHFR was epigenetically inactivated constituted loss-of-function alleles for mitotic checkpoint control. Taken together, these findings shed light on the pathway by which the mitotic checkpoint is bypassed in cancer cells and suggest that inactivation of checkpoint genes is much more widespread than previously suspected.