DKK3 explained

Dickkopf-related protein 3 is a protein in the Dickkopf family that in humans is encoded by the DKK3 gene.^[1]

This gene encodes a protein that is a member of the dickkopf family. The secreted protein contains two cysteine rich regions and is involved in embryonic development through its interactions with the Wnt signaling pathway. The expression of this gene is decreased in a variety of cancer cell lines and it may function as a tumor suppressor gene. Alternative splicing results in multiple transcript variants encoding the same protein.^[2]

Further reading

• Maruyama K, Sugano S . Oligo-capping: a simple method to replace the cap structure of eukaryotic mRNAs with oligoribonucleotides . Gene . 138 . 1–2 . 171–4 . January 1994 . 8125298 . 10.1016/0378-1119(94)90802-8 .
• Andersson B, Wentland MA, Ricafrente JY, Liu W, Gibbs RA . A "double adaptor" method for improved shotgun library construction . Analytical Biochemistry . 236 . 1 . 107–13 . April 1996 . 8619474 . 10.1006/abio.1996.0138 .
• Yu W, Andersson B, Worley KC, Muzny DM, Ding Y, Liu W, Ricafrente JY, Wentland MA, Lennon G, Gibbs RA . 6 . Large-scale concatenation cDNA sequencing . Genome Research . 7 . 4 . 353–8 . April 1997 . 9110174 . 139146 . 10.1101/gr.7.4.353 .
• Suzuki Y, Yoshitomo-Nakagawa K, Maruyama K, Suyama A, Sugano S . Construction and characterization of a full length-enriched and a 5'-end-enriched cDNA library . Gene . 200 . 1–2 . 149–56 . October 1997 . 9373149 . 10.1016/S0378-1119(97)00411-3 .
• Tsuji T, Miyazaki M, Sakaguchi M, Inoue Y, Namba M . A REIC gene shows down-regulation in human immortalized cells and human tumor-derived cell lines . Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications . 268 . 1 . 20–4 . February 2000 . 10652205 . 10.1006/bbrc.1999.2067 .
• Kobayashi K, Ouchida M, Tsuji T, Hanafusa H, Miyazaki M, Namba M, Shimizu N, Shimizu K . 6 . Reduced expression of the REIC/Dkk-3 gene by promoter-hypermethylation in human tumor cells . Gene . 282 . 1–2 . 151–8 . January 2002 . 11814687 . 10.1016/S0378-1119(01)00838-1 .
• Mao B, Niehrs C . Kremen2 modulates Dickkopf2 activity during Wnt/LRP6 signaling . Gene . 302 . 1–2 . 179–83 . January 2003 . 12527209 . 10.1016/S0378-1119(02)01106-X .
• Kurose K, Sakaguchi M, Nasu Y, Ebara S, Kaku H, Kariyama R, Arao Y, Miyazaki M, Tsushima T, Namba M, Kumon H, Huh NH . 6 . Decreased expression of REIC/Dkk-3 in human renal clear cell carcinoma . The Journal of Urology . 171 . 3 . 1314–8 . March 2004 . 14767340 . 10.1097/01.ju.0000101047.64379.d4 .
• Hoang BH, Kubo T, Healey JH, Yang R, Nathan SS, Kolb EA, Mazza B, Meyers PA, Gorlick R . 6 . Dickkopf 3 inhibits invasion and motility of Saos-2 osteosarcoma cells by modulating the Wnt-beta-catenin pathway . Cancer Research . 64 . 8 . 2734–9 . April 2004 . 15087387 . 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-03-1952 . free .
• Roman-Gomez J, Jimenez-Velasco A, Agirre X, Castillejo JA, Navarro G, Barrios M, Andreu EJ, Prosper F, Heiniger A, Torres A . 6 . Transcriptional silencing of the Dickkopfs-3 (Dkk-3) gene by CpG hypermethylation in acute lymphoblastic leukaemia . British Journal of Cancer . 91 . 4 . 707–13 . August 2004 . 15226763 . 2364778 . 10.1038/sj.bjc.6602008 .
• Zhang Z, Henzel WJ . Signal peptide prediction based on analysis of experimentally verified cleavage sites . Protein Science . 13 . 10 . 2819–24 . October 2004 . 15340161 . 2286551 . 10.1110/ps.04682504 .
• Hsieh SY, Hsieh PS, Chiu CT, Chen WY . Dickkopf-3/REIC functions as a suppressor gene of tumor growth . Oncogene . 23 . 57 . 9183–9 . December 2004 . 15516983 . 10.1038/sj.onc.1208138 . 10188362 .
• Ftouh S, Akbar MT, Hirsch SR, de Belleroche JS . Down-regulation of Dickkopf 3, a regulator of the Wnt signalling pathway, in elderly schizophrenic subjects . Journal of Neurochemistry . 94 . 2 . 520–30 . July 2005 . 15998302 . 10.1111/j.1471-4159.2005.03239.x . 679696 . free .
• Kuphal S, Lodermeyer S, Bataille F, Schuierer M, Hoang BH, Bosserhoff AK . Expression of Dickkopf genes is strongly reduced in malignant melanoma . Oncogene . 25 . 36 . 5027–36 . August 2006 . 16568085 . 10.1038/sj.onc.1209508 . 12065588 .
• Urakami S, Shiina H, Enokida H, Kawakami T, Kawamoto K, Hirata H, Tanaka Y, Kikuno N, Nakagawa M, Igawa M, Dahiya R . 6 . Combination analysis of hypermethylated Wnt-antagonist family genes as a novel epigenetic biomarker panel for bladder cancer detection . Clinical Cancer Research . 12 . 7 Pt 1 . 2109–16 . April 2006 . 16609023 . 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-05-2468 . free .
• Veeck J, Bektas N, Hartmann A, Kristiansen G, Heindrichs U, Knüchel R, Dahl E . Wnt signalling in human breast cancer: expression of the putative Wnt inhibitor Dickkopf-3 (DKK3) is frequently suppressed by promoter hypermethylation in mammary tumours . Breast Cancer Research . 10 . 5 . R82 . 2008 . 18826564 . 2614517 . 10.1186/bcr2151 . free .
• Veeck J, Wild PJ, Fuchs T, Schüffler PJ, Hartmann A, Knüchel R, Dahl E . Prognostic relevance of Wnt-inhibitory factor-1 (WIF1) and Dickkopf-3 (DKK3) promoter methylation in human breast cancer . BMC Cancer . 9 . 217 . July 2009 . 19570204 . 2717119 . 10.1186/1471-2407-9-217 . free .

Notes and References

1. Krupnik VE, Sharp JD, Jiang C, Robison K, Chickering TW, Amaravadi L, Brown DE, Guyot D, Mays G, Leiby K, Chang B, Duong T, Goodearl AD, Gearing DP, Sokol SY, McCarthy SA . 6 . Functional and structural diversity of the human Dickkopf gene family . Gene . 238 . 2 . 301–13 . October 1999 . 10570958 . 10.1016/S0378-1119(99)00365-0 .
2. Web site: Entrez Gene: DKK3 dickkopf homolog 3 (Xenopus laevis).