Fig. 1: High expression of the H2AZ isoforms correlates with GBM and GSC stemness.

Gene expression of selected H2A variants and canonical H2A in TCGA GBM (A) and GSCs (B). Only the top 4 canonical H2A genes (blue font) with the highest expression are shown. A *p < 1.0e−20 (Mann–Whitney test); B *p < 0.01 (two-tailed unpaired Student’s t test) denotes that the given variant H2A gene expression is significantly higher than expression of any of the shown canonical H2A genes. C Comparison of H2AZ mRNA levels in non-tumors vs. gliomas of different clinical grades in TCGA and REMBRANDT cohorts. Man–Whitney test, *p < 0.05, **p < 1.0e−04, ***p < 1.0e−12. D Correlative analysis of H2AZ levels with glioma patient survival in multiple glioma patient cohorts. OS overall survival. Wald test. E Correlative analysis of H2AZ levels with classical (CL), mesenchymal (MES) and proneural (PN) GBM subtypes in TCGA GBM. Man–Whitney test, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. F Detection of H2AZ2 RNA transcripts in tumor cells from glioma patients of different clinical grades using the RNAscope assay. Scale bar, 10 µm. G RNAscope scores of H2AZ2 transcripts in different grades of glioma using glioma patient TMA (from F). H2AZ2 mRNA transcripts counts are binned into three score classes according to the RNAscope ® Assay Semi-Quantative Scoring Guideline. Differences in gene expression are estimated using Fisher-Freeman-Halton exact test. **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.