Comparison of methylation patterns generated from genomic and cell-line derived DNA using the Illumina Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip array

Objectives Genomic DNA (gDNA) is the optimal source of DNA for methylation analysis. This study compared methylation patterns in gDNA derived from blood with cell-line derived DNA (clDNA) from the same individuals. The clDNA had been generated via an Epstein-Barr virus transformation of the participant’s lymphocytes. This analysis sought to determine whether clDNA has the potential to be utilised in lieu of finite/unavailable gDNA in methylation analyses using Illumina Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip arrays that assess 862,927 CpG sites. Results DNA samples were divided into two groups with eight gDNA and eight matched clDNA samples compared in each group (n = 16 individuals with 32 samples in total). Methylation patterns for gDNA samples generated for both groups were compared to the clDNA equivalent samples using Partek® Genomics Suite® to assess whether the significantly different CpG sites were consistent between both groups. In total, 28,632 CpG sites with significantly different levels of methylation (p < ×10−8) were common to both groups while 828,072 CpG sites assessed by the MethylationEPIC array were not significantly different in either group. This indicates that there is potential for clDNA to be used as a replacement for finite gDNA samples when absolutely necessary in DNA methylation studies.