| BackgroundHepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the world’s one of the most common tumor of high malignant degree, and is a major cause of the cancer-related death. Our country is HCC incidence area. Although the diagnosis and treatment of HCC have improved in the recent years,the actual prognosis of HCC patients are still poor. Therefore, research concerning early diagnosis and treatment of HCC is the current hot topic, and it has important significance especially for improving the prognosis of the HCC patients.MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small (20-24 nucleotide) noncoding RNA gene products, they may post-transcriptionally modulate the products of gene expression by depressing the stability or translational efficiency of 3’UTRs region of mRNAs. A large number of studies have shown that, miRNAs are playing important role in a variety of malignant tumors. MicroRNAs can modulate the key proteins in the oncogenic pathways, or act as a tumor suppressor at the post-transcription level. Coding the miRNA-206 genes is located in chromosome 6 p12.2. Studies using miRNAs array analysis and RT-PCR found that, the expression o f miRNA-206 is decreased in human malignant tumors. But the study of miRNA-206 in HCC tissues has not been reported, and the relationship between the expression of miRNA-206 and metastasis, tumor volume and prognosis of patients is still unknown.Objective Our study aimed to explore the relationship of miRNA-206 and tumor, and to explore the changing tendency of miR-206 in HCC, and characterize its contributions to the tumor development and progression. To explore the role of miRNA-206 in HCC, for the diagnosis, treatment and assessment prognosis of HCC provide new targets.Methods Hepatocellular carcinoma tissue samples and matched normal adjacent non-tumor tissues were obtained during the surgeries. The expression of MiR-206 were examined using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR). The relationship between miR-206 expression and prognosis-related clinical characteristics was also investigated. In extro vivo examination, the expression of miR-206 in the human hepatocellular carcinoma cell lines (HepG2, Bel-7402 and SMMC-7721) and human immortal liver cell line (LO2) were also examined. The Bel-7402 cell lines were transfected with miRNA-206 mimics, then the cell proliferation, migration,and invasion ability were detected by MTT and transwall.Results1. In 88 hepatocellular carcinoma patients, the expression of miR-206 in tumors tissues is significantly decreased compared to the matched adjacent non-tumor tissues, and the expression in adjacent non-tumor tissue is also lower than normal liver tissues. In addition, when studying the changing tendency of miR-206 expression in one specific patient,67% of the patients have downregulated miR-206 expression in tumour tissue compared with their matched NAT samples. The correlation analysis showed that, the decreased expression of miR-206 was significantly associated with advanced clinical stages and the distant metastasis.2. The expression of miRNA-206 was lower in human hepatocellular carcinoma cell lines, including HepG2,Bel-7402 and SMMC-7721, compared with the normal liver cell line LO2.3. The proliferation,migration and invasion ability of Bel-7402 cell line was significantly decreased after transfecting with miRNA-206 mimics compared to negative control.ConclusionThe expression of miR-206 is decreased in HCC tumor tissues compared with adjacent non-tumor tissues, and the decreased expression is correlated with the clinical characters and poor prognosis of the HCC patients.In addition, the expression of miR-206 is down-regulated in extro vivo HCC cell lines. The transfection of miR-206 mimics may decrease the proliferation ability of HCC cell lines, as well as the tumor migration and invasion ability. This study indicated that miR-206 may be a good candidate as a novel prognostic indicator in HCC patients. |
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