What is the mechanism of action of decitabine?
Decitabine reactivates unmethylated p21WAF1 in some AML cell lines but the possible occurrence of p21WAF1 methylation in AML in vivo has not been studied in detail and decitabine effects on p21WAF1 chromatin remodeling have not been reported. We also discuss the following questions: What is the best administration schedule of decitabine in solid tumors? Is there tumor type specificity for decitabine-based epigenetic therapy? We found that p21WAF1 mRNA was undetectable in 6 of 24 AML patient samples and 4 of 5 AML cell lines but there was no evidence of p21WAF1 promoter methylation.