Because survivors of pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) are more likely to be obese than unaffected contemporaries, we compared DNA methylation profiles between normal-weight and obese survivors at adiposity-associated CpG sites previously-reported by epigenome-wide association studies (EWAS) of body mass index (BMI) in the general population. We selected 96 ALL survivors from the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study: 48 obese and 48 normal weight. The Illumina HumanMethylation450 BeadChip was used to compare DNA methylation at 211 loci identified in EWAS of BMI in the general population. Thirty-nine loci were associated (false discovery rate <0.05) with obesity among survivors who only received chemotherapy (n = 49). No loci were significantly associated with obesity among CRT-exposed survivors (n = 47). Our results suggest that previously identified BMI-DNA methylation loci are associated with obesity in ALL survivors who were spared CRT, while no loci were significantly associated with obesity in survivors who received CRT.
© 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.