bioRxiv Science⌕ Search

bioRxiv · 10.1101/2020.08.27.269654

MicroRNA-224 Promotes Cell Migration and Invasion by Targeting HOXA5 expression in Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Abstract

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are involved in the regulation of multiple cellular pathways and play a key role in the development and progression of tumor. Based on the cellular function of their targets, miRNAs play the role of oncogenes or tumor suppressor genes. Multiple studies have shown that abnormal expression of miRNAs has close relation with the incidence of HCC, but the mechanism of miRNAs in HCC still needs further research. In the present study, we showed that the overexpression of miR-224 can reduce the mRNA and protein expression of ADAM17 and HOXA5, the silencing of miR-224 can increase the protein expression of ADAM17 and HOXA5. Dual luciferase reporter assays showed that miR-224 can directly regulate the expression of ADAM17 and HOXA5. Importantly, we found that miR-224 positively regulates cell migration and invasion in HCC, miR-224 overexpression can promote the migration and invasion of BEL-7402 cell, and miR-224 silencing can suppress the migration and invasion of BEL-7402 cell. miR-224 overexpression can result in the redistribution of cell cycle, the cell percentage of S phase was increased significantly, the cell percentage of G1 phase was decreased significantly, and there is no noticeable change for the cell percentage of G2 phase. These results demonstrated that it may be exert the function of oncogenes in a particular link of cancer cell growth. In conclusion, these results suggest that miR-224 will become a promising biological target in the treatment strategy of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Explore related subjects

Keep this discovery

Explore connections, maps & timelines

BibTeXRIS

Liu, Y., Lin, C., Wang, D., Wen, S., Wang, J., Chen, Z., Du, J., Ning, C., Feng, D.. 2020-08-27. MicroRNA-224 Promotes Cell Migration and Invasion by Targeting HOXA5 expression in Hepatocellular Carcinoma. https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.08.27.269654

Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.

KEEP EXPLORING

Related preprints

The methionine cycle sustains the mesenchymal phenotype of tumor cells and drives PDA progression

Mesenchymal traits are associated with poor prognosis in Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma (PDA), but direct targeting of mesenchymal tumor cells remains a challenge. Metabolic profiling of tumor cells isolated from murine PDA and liver metastases (LM) revealed that LM rely more on the methionine cycle than does primary PDA. This metabolic shift was specifically associated with increased activation of the methionine cycle in mesenchymal tumor cells compared to differentiated tumor cells. We show that the targeting of the key enzyme of the methionine cycle S-adenosylhomocysteine hydrolase (SAHH) in mesenchymal cells lowers the levels of homocysteine (Hcy) and glutathione, resulting in reduced antioxidant capacity, deregulated intracellular calcium homeostasis, and ultimately loss of mesenchymal markers. Together, these events decrease cell proliferation and invasion, blunting the tumorigenic and metastatic potential of SAHH-deficient cells, eventually impeding tumor growth and progression of the metastatic disease. Clinically, the high expression of SAHH in patients with mesenchymal PDA is correlated with poor survival, positioning SAHH as a potential therapeutic target to impede the pro-metastatic, mesenchymal phenotype of PDA.

cancer biology↗

Arrest-associated transcriptional programmes outweigh apoptosis-associated programmes in treatment-naive pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma

Background: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is driven by mutant KRAS, and RAS inhibitors now extend survival in previously treated metastatic disease. Whether treatment shrinks a tumour or only halts its growth depends partly on whether cancer cells die or stop dividing, yet how untreated PDAC cells are balanced between these programmes is unknown. Aims: We aimed to characterise the balance between apoptosis-associated and arrest-associated transcriptional programmes in treatment-naive PDAC and to examine their relationships with tumour subtype, TGM2 expression, tissue organisation, survival and drug sensitivity. Methods and results: We scored 52,999 malignant cells from 18 untreated patients in the Hwang atlas using a transcriptional contrast between genes associated with apoptosis and genes associated with resistance to apoptosis or cell-cycle arrest. In every patient the contrast was shifted toward the arrest-associated side: using equality between the two sides as the dividing threshold, 86.3% of cells with an informative score fell on that side, although the proportion depends on the threshold chosen. The shift recurred in the independent Steele atlas (median 71.6% per sample, range 37.1% to 90.8%). In the discovery cohort, tumours with higher basal-like scores had fewer arrest-side cells, and TGM2 expression was modestly higher on the arrest-associated side in both cohorts. The contrast did not track cell-line drug sensitivity or survival in bulk tumours. Conclusion: Untreated PDAC cells show a reproducible transcriptional bias toward anti-apoptotic and cell-cycle-arrest programmes. Whether this bias predicts cellular responses to treatment remains to be tested.

cancer biology↗

Quantitative live imaging reveals region-dependent medulloblastoma disseminationin the zebrafish brain

Medulloblastoma is the most common malignant pediatric brain tumor, and relapse is frequently driven by dissemination within the central nervous system. Yet the early dynamics of tumor spread remain difficult to resolve in vivo. Here, we orthotopically transplanted human medulloblastoma cells into larval zebrafish and followed individual xenografts by longitudinal high-resolution confocal imaging. ONS-76 showed particularly robust dissemination, with hindbrain tumors spreading into the developing cerebellum in 81.5% of larvae, more than fourfold the frequency observed for forebrain or midbrain tumors. Disseminating cells extended along brain-surface and leptomeningeal-like regions and frequently associated with cerebral vasculature. Quantitative analysis of tumor area, perimeter, compactness, convex hull area, and fractal dimension captured changes in growth and spatial complexity over time. Dasatinib reduced tumor expansion and dissemination-related features in a concentration-dependent manner, while higher doses revealed host toxicity. These findings establish a powerful in vivo model for resolving medulloblastoma dissemination and therapeutic response.

cancer biology↗