Fig. 3.

Hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) are classified based upon methylation and mutational status. In the upper figure, all 81 HCCs are classified by hierarchical clustering analysis based upon the degree of methylation and β-catenin or p53 mutations as published previously.³⁹ The heat map (green-black-red) shows the tumors with a lower methylation density as green, and higher methylation density as red. The Y-axis shows the loci analyzed. A solid triangle represents a tumor with a β-catenin mutation, and an open triangle indicates a HCC with a p53 mutation. As depicted, β-catenin mutations were significantly associated with the Group 2 HCCs on the right (p < 0.0001). The table in the lower half of the figure highlights the significant association between higher methylation in Group 2 HCCs and β-catenin mutations. FAL indicates the "fractional allelic loss", or proportion of analyzed loci with allelic imbalance, or LOH.