Hang Tran

Helios Scholar

Multiple Myeloma (MM) is a cancer of plasma cells in which the plasma cells grow uncontrollably in bone marrow and blood. DNA methylation variability in MM patients’ genomes affects MM progression. The goal of this study is to detect differences in DNA methylation patterns in MM using a bisulfite sequencing alternative. Here, we used the NEBNext Enzymatic Methyl-seq (EM-seq) kit to construct libraries from 2 clinical sample groups known to have hypermethylation (the t(4;14) group) and hypomethylation (the t(14;16) group), respectively, in their genomes. The constructed libraries have higher conversion efficiency (23%) compared to the current standard technique, Agilent sodium bisulfite conversion, which yields less than 1% conversion rate. The libraries are also within the expected fragment size from 370 to 420 bp. Future experiments will involve sequencing libraries on an Illumina NovaSeq 6000 and using Bismark to assess alignment and methylation status. The expectation is higher overall methylation in the groups with t(4;14) translocation; however, findings so far already suggest that the NEBNext EM-seq kit can be added to the catalog in the Collaborative Sequencing Center at TGen.