Figure 1

Epigenetic enzymes and their inhibitors. The figure shows the interactions between epigenetic enzymes (writers, erasers, readers) and nucleosomes. The nucleosome core consists of a histone octamer (mainly two copies each of H2A, H2B, H3 and H4) that is wrapped by a nuclear DNA strand of 147 bp. DNA methylation and hydroxymethylation are depicted as black and grey circles, respectively. DNA methylation is induced by DNA methyltransferases (DNMTs). To inhibit DNA methylation, DNMT inhibitors (DNMTis) are used to target and suppress DNMTs. Histone tales can be post-transcriptionally modified using enzymes such as histone acetyltransferases (HATs). Histone acetylation can be inhibited by histone deacetylases (HDACs), and HDAC inhibitors (HDACis) can be used as HDAC suppressors.