miR-142 Suppresses Endometrial Cancer Proliferation In Vitro and In Vivo by Targeting Cyclin D1

MicroRNAs, long non-coding RNAs, and circular RNAs and gynecological cancers: focus on metastasis

Gynecologic cancer is a significant cause of death in women worldwide, with cervical cancer, ovarian cancer, and endometrial cancer being among the most well-known types. The initiation and progression of gynecologic cancers involve a variety of biological functions, including angiogenesis and metastasis-given that death mostly occurs from metastatic tumors that have invaded the surrounding tissues. Therefore, understanding the molecular pathways underlying gynecologic cancer metastasis is critical for enhancing patient survival and outcomes. Recent research has revealed the contribution of numerous non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) to metastasis and invasion of gynecologic cancer by affecting specific cellular pathways. This review focuses on three types of gynecologic cancer (ovarian, endometrial, and cervical) and three kinds of ncRNAs (long non-coding RNAs, microRNAs, and circular RNAs). We summarize the detailed role of non-coding RNAs in the different pathways and molecular interactions involved in the invasion and metastasis of these cancers.

gGATLDA: lncRNA-disease association prediction based on graph-level graph attention network

Background

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are related to human diseases by regulating gene expression. Identifying lncRNA-disease associations (LDAs) will contribute to diagnose, treatment, and prognosis of diseases. However, the identification of LDAs by the biological experiments is time-consuming, costly and inefficient. Therefore, the development of efficient and high-accuracy computational methods for predicting LDAs is of great significance.

Results

In this paper, we propose a novel computational method (gGATLDA) to predict LDAs based on graph-level graph attention network. Firstly, we extract the enclosing subgraphs of each lncRNA-disease pair. Secondly, we construct the feature vectors by integrating lncRNA similarity and disease similarity as node attributes in subgraphs. Finally, we train a graph neural network (GNN) model by feeding the subgraphs and feature vectors to it, and use the trained GNN model to predict lncRNA-disease potential association scores. The experimental results show that our method can achieve higher area under the receiver operation characteristic curve (AUC), area under the precision recall curve (AUPR), accuracy and F1-Score than the state-of-the-art methods in five fold cross-validation. Case studies show that our method can effectively identify lncRNAs associated with breast cancer, gastric cancer, prostate cancer, and renal cancer.

Conclusion

The experimental results indicate that our method is a useful approach for predicting potential LDAs.

The Role of miRNAs in the Regulation of Endometrial Cancer Invasiveness and Metastasis-A Systematic Review

Endometrial cancer (EC) is the most common genital cancer in women with increasing death rates. MiRNAs are short non-coding RNAs that regulate gene expression on the post-transcriptional levels. Multiple studies demonstrated a fundamental role of miRNAs in the regulation of carcinogenesis. This systematic review is a comprehensive overview of the role of miRNAs in the regulation of cancer cell invasiveness and metastasis in EC. The literature was searched for studies investigating the role of miRNAs in the regulation of invasiveness and metastasis in EC. We explored PubMed, Embase, and Scopus using the following keywords: miRNA, metastasis, invasiveness, endometrial cancer. Data were collected from 163 articles that described the expression and role of 106 miRNAs in the regulation of EC invasiveness and metastasis out of which 63 were tumor suppressor miRNAs, and 38 were oncomiRNAs. Five miRNAs had a discordant role in different studies. Moreover, we identified 66 miRNAs whose expression in tumor tissue or concentration in serum correlated with at least one clinical parameter. These findings suggest a crucial role of miRNAs in the regulation of EC invasiveness and metastasis and present them as potential prognostic factors for patients with EC.

LncRNA NEAT1 accelerates breast cancer progression through regulating miR-410-3p/ CCND1 axis

BACKGROUND

Breast cancer is the most common malignant tumor and usually occurs in women. Studies have shown that lncRNA nuclear enriched abundant transcript 1 (NEAT1) contributes to breast cancer progression. This study intends to further investigate the molecular mechanism of NEAT1 in breast cancer.

METHODS

The expression levels of NEAT1, miR-410-3p and Cyclin D1 (CCND1) were detected by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) in breast cancer tissues and cells. Kaplan-Meier analysis and the log-rank test were performed to determine the relationship between NEAT1 and overall survival. Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) assay analyzed cell proliferation. Transwell assay was performed to examine cell migration and invasion. The protein levels of CCND1 and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-related proteins (E-cadherin, N-cadherin and Vimentin) were measured by western blot. The target relationship was predicted by bioinformatics analysis, and confirmed by luciferase reporter assay and RNA Immunoprecipitation (RIP) assay. Xenograft analysis was used to evaluate the tumor growth in vivo.

RESULTS

NEAT1 and CCND1 were upregulated, while miR-410-3p was down-regulated in breast cancer tissues and cells. Higher NEAT1 expression level was associated with lower survival rate of breast cancer patients. Knockdown of miR-410-3p restored silenced NEAT1-mediated the inhibition of on proliferation, migration, invasion and EMT of breast cancer cells. In addition, NEAT1 regulated CCND1 expression by sponging miR-410-3p in breast cancer cells. NEAT1 knockdown blocked the tumor growth in vivo.

CONCLUSION

NEAT1 induced breast cancer progression by regulating the miR-410-3p/CCND1 axis, indicating that NEAT1 may be a potential therapeutic target in breast cancer.

Diagnostic Value of MicroRNA 21 in Endometrial Cancer and Benign Lesions and its Differential Expression in Relation to Clinicopathological Parameters

BACKGROUND

Endometrial cancer is one of the most common malignancies among women worldwide. Although this cancer is often diagnosed at early stages, the need for biomarkers of diagnosis remains a necessity to overcome conventional invasive procedures of diagnosis.

OBJECTIVE

In our study, we aim to investigate the diagnostic value of microRNA-21 in endometrial cancer and its relation to clinicopathological features.

METHODS

We used RT-qPCR to measure the expression of microRNA-21 in 71 tumor tissues, 53 adjacent tissues, and 54 benign lesions.

RESULTS

Our results show that microRNA-21 is a potential biomarker for endometrial cancer with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.925 (95% CI = 0.863 - 0.964, P<0.0001). The sensitivity was 84.51% (95% CI = 74.0 - 92.0) and specificity was 86.79% (95% CI = 74.7 - 94.5). For discrimination between benign lesions and controls the AUC was 0,881 with a sensitivity of 100% (95% CI = 93.4 - 100.0) and specificity of 66.04 % (95% CI = 51.7 - 78.5), and for discriminating benign lesions from tumors the AUC was 0,750 with a sensitivity of 54.93% (95% CI = 42.7 - 66.8) and specificity of 90.74% (95% CI = 79.7 - 96.9). We also found that tumors with elevated microRNA-21 expression are of advanced FIGO stage, high histological grades, and have cervical invasion, myometrial invasion and distant metastasis.

CONCLUSION

Our findings support the important role of miR-21 as a biomarker for the diagnosis of endometrial cancer. Further studies on minimally invasive/noninvasive samples such as serum, blood, and urine are necessary to provide a better alternative to current diagnosis methods.

Non-Coding RNAs as Prognostic Markers for Endometrial Cancer

Endometrial cancer (EC) has been classified over the years, for prognostic and therapeutic purposes. In recent years, classification systems have been emerging not only based on EC clinical and pathological characteristics but also on its genetic and epigenetic features. Noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) are emerging as promising markers in several cancer types, including EC, for which their prognostic value is currently under investigation and will likely integrate the present prognostic tools based on protein coding genes. This review aims to underline the importance of the genetic and epigenetic events in the EC tumorigenesis, by expounding upon the prognostic role of ncRNAs.

MicroRNA as Epigenetic Modifiers in Endometrial Cancer: A Systematic Review

Simple Summary

Endometrial cancer (EC) is the 2nd most common gynecologic cancer worldwide. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small noncoding RNAs that contribute to epigenetic regulation. The objective of this systematic review is to summarize our current knowledge on the role of miRNAs in the epigenetic deregulation of tumor-related genes in EC. It includes all miRNAs reported to be involved in EC including their roles in DNA methylation and RNA-associated silencing. This systematic review should be useful for development of novel strategies to improve diagnosis and risk assessment as well as for new treatments aimed at miRNAs, their target genes or DNA methylation.

Abstract

The objective of this systematic review is to summarize our current knowledge on the influence of miRNAs in the epigenetic deregulation of tumor-related genes in endometrial cancer (EC). We conducted a literature search on the role of miRNAs in the epigenetic regulation of EC applying the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. The following terms were used: microRNA, miRNA, miR, endometrial cancer, endometrium, epigenetic, epimutation, hypermethylation, lynch, deacetylase, DICER, novel biomarker, histone, chromatin. The miRNAs were classified and are presented according to their function (tumor suppressor or onco-miRNA), their targets (when known), their expression levels in EC tissue vs the normal surrounding tissue, and the degree of DNA methylation in miRNA loci and CpG sites. Data were collected from 201 articles, including 190 original articles, published between November 1, 2008 and September 30, 2020 identifying 313 different miRNAs implicated in epigenetic regulation of EC. Overall, we identified a total of 148 miRNAs with decreased expression in EC, 140 miRNAs with increased expression in EC, and 22 miRNAs with discordant expression levels. The literature implicated different epigenetic phenomena including altered miRNA expression levels (miR-182, -230), changes in the methylation of miRNA loci (miR-34b, -129-2, -130a/b, -152, -200b, -625) and increased/decreased methylation of target genes (miR-30d,-191). This work provides an overview of all miRNAs reported to be involved in epigenetic regulation in EC including DNA methylation and RNA-associated silencing. These findings may contribute to novel strategies in diagnosis, risk assessment, and treatments aimed at miRNAs, their target genes or DNA methylation.

Small Non-Coding-RNA in Gynecological Malignancies

Gynecologic malignancies, which include cancers of the cervix, ovary, uterus, vulva, vagina, and fallopian tube, are among the leading causes of female mortality worldwide, with the most prevalent being endometrial, ovarian, and cervical cancer. Gynecologic malignancies are complex, heterogeneous diseases, and despite extensive research efforts, the molecular mechanisms underlying their development and pathology remain largely unclear. Currently, mechanistic and therapeutic research in cancer is largely focused on protein targets that are encoded by about 1% of the human genome. Our current understanding of 99% of the genome, which includes noncoding RNA, is limited. The discovery of tens of thousands of noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs), possessing either structural or regulatory functions, has fundamentally altered our understanding of genetics, physiology, pathophysiology, and disease treatment as they relate to gynecologic malignancies. In recent years, it has become clear that ncRNAs are relatively stable, and can serve as biomarkers for cancer diagnosis and prognosis, as well as guide therapy choices. Here we discuss the role of small non-coding RNAs, i.e., microRNAs (miRs), P-Element induced wimpy testis interacting (PIWI) RNAs (piRNAs), and tRNA-derived small RNAs in gynecological malignancies, specifically focusing on ovarian, endometrial, and cervical cancer.

Prognostic value of miR-142 in solid tumors: a meta-analysis

Several studies on the prognostic value of microRNA 142 (miR-142) in solid tumors have reported conflicting results. Therefore, the aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the relationship between the miR-142 and prognosis in solid tumors. A comprehensive search for relevant studies was conducted until 10 November 2020. Studies that investigated the prognostic significance of the miR-142 in solid tumors were included. The hazard ratio and 95% confidence interval were calculated using a random-effects model. All data analyses were performed using the STATA 12.0 software (Stata Corporation, College Station, TX, U.S.A.). Twenty articles involving 2451 participants were included in the meta-analysis. The results showed that high miR-142 expression was a better predictor of overall survival (OS) (HR = 0.66, 95% CI: 0.47–0.93) and disease-free/progression-free/recurrence-free survival (DFS/PFS/RFS) (HR = 0.71, 95% CI: 0.55–0.91) compared with low miR-142 expression. MiR-142 can be used as an effective prognostic marker for patients with solid tumors. Future large prospective studies are warranted to further confirm the present findings.

MiRNA-128 and MiRNA-142 Regulate Tumorigenesis and EMT in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma Through HOXA10

Background

Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) accounts for more than 90% of all oral cavity cancers, and the 5-year survival rate for OSCC patients remains unsatisfactory. MiRNA-128/miRNA-142 has been reported to work as a tumor suppressor in diverse tumors. However, the biological function of miR-128/miR-142 in OSCC is still unknown.

Methods

The expression of miR-128/miR-142 and homeobox A10 (HOXA10) in OSCC tissues and cells was measured by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). The effects of miR-128/miR-142 or HOXA10 on proliferation, migration, invasion and apoptosis were detected by 3-(4, 5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl)-2, 5-diphenyl-2-H-tetrazolium bromide (MTT), transwell and flow cytometry assays, respectively. The expression levels of epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT)-associated proteins (E-cadherin, N-cadherin and Vimentin), proliferation-associated protein ki-67 and HOXA10 were detected by Western blot assay. The interaction between HOXA10 and miR-128/miR-142 was predicted by TargetScan, and then confirmed by dual-luciferase reporter assay.

Results

MiR-128/miR-142 was downregulated in OSCC tissues and cells. Overexpression of miR-128/miR-142 inhibited proliferation, migration, invasion and EMT and induced apoptosis in OSCC cells. HOXA10 as the target of miR-128/miR-142 was verified in OSCC cells. Knockdown of HOXA10 also repressed proliferation, migration, invasion and EMT and boosted apoptosis in OSCC cells. Upregulation of miR-128/miR-142 hindered the expression level of HOXA10, while introduction of HOXA10 weakened the effect.

Conclusion

MiR-128/miR-142 suppressed OSCC tumorigenesis and metastasis by targeting HOXA10, providing a new promising therapeutic approach for OSCC patient diagnosis and treatment.

Prominent roles of microRNA-142 in cancer

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are single-stranded non-coding RNAs that regulate gene expression post-transcriptionally via mRNA degradation, or translational repression. They have important roles in normal development and homeostasis maintenance. Many studies have revealed that aberrant expression of miRNAs is associated with development of pathological conditions, including cancers. MiRNAs can either promote or suppress tumorigenesis based on the regulation of gene expression by targeting multiple molecules. In recent years, several miRNAs have been reported to be dysregulated in various cancers. Most recent findings have shown that miR-142 gene, located at chromosome 17q22, is involved in cellular migration, proliferation, and apoptosis in different human cancers. The present review discusses some molecular mechanisms and the expression status of miRNA-142 in the pathogenesis of various cancers.

Progesterone induces cell apoptosis via the CACNA2D3/Ca2+/p38 MAPK pathway in endometrial cancer

Endometrial cancer (EC) is one of the most common malignant gynecological tumors in women. The main treatments for EC (surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy) produce significant side effects. Thus, it is urgent to identify promising therapeutic targets and prognostic markers. CACNA2D3, as a member of the calcium channel regulatory α2δ subunit family, is reported to exert a tumor suppressive effect in numerous cancers. However, the function of CACNA2D3 in EC is not well known. In the present study, CACNA2D3 was lowly expressed in EC tissues and cells. The overexpression of CACNA2D3 via lentiviral particle injection significantly blocked the tumor growth in an in vivo xenograft model. In vitro, the overexpression of CACNA2D3 markedly inhibited cell proliferation and migration, and promoted cell apoptosis and calcium influx. These data revealed that CACNA2D3 functions as a tumor suppressor in EC. It was also revealed that the addition of progesterone (P4) blocked tumor growth in Ishikawa-injected nude mice. P4 induced the expression of CACNA2D3 in vivo and in vitro, and the silencing of CACNA2D3 affected P4-inhibited cell proliferation and P4-induced cell apoptosis and calcium influx. In Ishikawa cells, P4 enhanced the expression of phosphorylated (p)-p38 MAPK and PTEN, but blocked the levels of p-PI3K and p-AKT. The knockdown of CACNA2D3 blocked the function of P4. These data revealed that P4 promoted cell apoptosis via the activation of the CACNA2D3/Ca²⁺/p38 MAPK pathway, and blocked cell proliferation via suppression of the PI3K/AKT pathway. Collectively, these findings indicated the antitumor role of CACNA2D3 in EC, and revealed the mechanism of P4 inhibition of EC progression, which provided a new target for EC therapy and new evidence for P4 in EC therapy.

MiR-181c affects estrogen-dependent endometrial carcinoma cell growth by targeting PTEN

MicroRNAs (miRNAs), which is a type of non-coding and single-stranded small molecule RNA, bind either completely or incompletely to 3'-UTR of the target gene mRNA to inhibit mRNA translation or degradation. In our study, we aimed to explore the roles and mechanisms of miR-181c in the apoptosis of RL95-2 human endometrial carcinoma cells. Cell activity and apoptosis were detected by cell counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) assay and flow cytometry (FCM), respectively. Related mRNAs and proteins expression was determined by quantitative real-time reverse transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) and western blot assays, respectively. The binding capacity of PTEN-3'-UTR and miR-181c was assessed by luciferase reporter assay. The obtained results suggested that E2 evidently increased the cell activity of RL95-2 cells. In addition, miR-181c inhibitor suppressed the cell viability and enhanced the apoptosis capacity of E2-induced RL95-2 cells and distinctly reduced the miR-181c expression. We also found that miR-181c could bind to PTEN-3'-UTR and miR-181c inhibitor up-regulated the expression level of PTEN in E2-induced RL95-2 cells. Besides, overexpression of PTEN markedly promoted the apoptosis of E2-induced RL95-2 cells through regulating the Bax and Bcl-2 expression, and modulated the expression of AKT pathway, p53 and Cyclin D. In conclusion, our findings revealed that miR-181c affected the estrogen-dependent endometrial carcinoma cell growth by targeting PTEN. The potential effects of miR-181c on the apoptosis of E2-induced RL95-2 cells suggest that miR-181c could be an effective target for endometrial carcinoma therapies.