Microbiome and Epigenetic Interactions in Cervical Cancer

Cervical cancer (CC) is one of the most prevalent gynaecological malignancies, seriously affecting the overall survival and quality of life among women across the globe. Along with conventional risk factors, research over the past few decades also focused on the role of tumour microbiota in developing different cancers. In CC, infection with hrHPV is considered as a necessary cause for neoplastic transformation. HPV hijacks the host cell and alters the gene expression and signalling pathways, ultimately resulting in tumour development. In addition to HPV, the existence of cervicovaginal microbiota also plays significant role in progression or regression of the cancer. Cancer patients often show up a distinct microbial fauna such as Fusobacterium, Sneathia, Anaerococcus, Peptostreptococcus, Gardnerella, Prevotella, Dialister, Fannyhessea, Streptococcus, Megasphaera, Mycoplasma, and Chlamydia which will not be present in healthy individuals and hence can be considered as a biomarker for cervical cancer. Various metabolites like lactate, butyrate, propionate, lipopolysaccharides, peptidoglycans, etc. have the potential to promote or prevent the tumorigenesis by epigenetic modification and downstream signalling modulation. In this chapter, we review the epigenetic modifications in cervical cancer and the distinct microbial fauna and its epigenetics cross talk that results in tumour progression or regression.