Early stages of meningioma tumorigenesis are closely linked to inactivation of one or more members of the 4.1 superfamily, including the neurofibromatosis type 2 (NF2) and 4.1B (DAL-1) genes, which interact with the 14-3-3 protein family.
Given the homology between DAL-1 and NF2 and the identification of significant LOH in the region of DAL-1 in lung, breast and brain tumors, we investigated the possibility that loss of expression of DAL-1 was important for meningioma development.