SPOP and non-small cell lung carcinoma: To determine whether the low SPOP expression in NSCLC is caused by DNA hypermethylation, our study searched the Human Genome Database for the presence of CpG islands in the SPOP promoter using Online software (http://www.urogene.org/methprimer) and found some CpG islands in the vicinity of the transcription start site (Fig. 1a).