The SMYD family proteins in immunology: An update of their obvious and non-obvious relations with the immune system

Teresa Rubio-Tomás

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e07387

The SMYD family proteins in immunology: An update of their obvious and non-obvious relations with the immune system

Heliyon. 2021 Jun 24;7(6):e07387. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e07387. eCollection 2021 Jun.

Author

Teresa Rubio-Tomás^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Institut d'Investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer (IDIBAPS), 08036, Barcelona, Spain.
² School of Medicine, University of Crete, 70013, Herakleion, Crete, Greece.
³ Biomedical Sciences Research Center Alexander Fleming, 16672, Vari, Greece.

Abstract

Epigenetics is an emerging field, due to its relevance in the regulation of a wide range of biological processes. The Su(Var)3-9, Enhancer-of-zeste and Trithorax (SET) and Myeloid, Nervy, and DEAF-1 (MYND) domain-containing (SMYD) proteins, named SMYD1, SMYD2, SMYD3, SMYD4 and SMYD5, are enzymes that catalyse methylation of histone and non-histone substrates, thereby playing a key role in gene expression regulation in many biological contexts, such as muscle development and physiology, haematopoiesis and many types of cancer. This review focuses on a relatively unexplored aspect of SMYD family members - their relation with immunology. Here, immunology is defined in the broadest sense of the word, including basic research on macrophage function or host immunity against pathogen infection, as well as clinical studies, most of which are centred on blood cancers.

Keywords: Cancer; Epigenetics; Immunology; Methyltransferases; Muscle; SMYD.

Publication types

Review