We have shown that DNA isolated from urine and primary tumors of bladder cancer patients show similar methylation profiles, displaying hypermethylation at a number of apoptosis-associated genes, including DAPK, BCL2, and TERT. These loci are not methylated in urine specimens from healthy controls [72], suggesting that such tumor-specific methylation markers have the potential to serve as diagnostic tools using a noninvasive sample procurement method. Here, BCL2 is linked to urinary bladder cancer.