Long noncoding RNA PVT1 has been reported to be dysregulated and play vital roles in a variety of cancers. However, the functions and molecular mechanisms of PVT1 in cervical cancer remain unclear. The objective of this study was to investigate the expression, clinical significance, biological roles, and underlying functional mechanisms of PVT1 in cervical cancer. Our results revealed that PVT1 is upregulated in cervical cancer tissues. Enhanced expression of PVT1 is associated with larger tumor size, advanced International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics stage, and poor prognosis of cervical cancer patients. Using gain-of-function and loss-of-function approaches, we demonstrated that overexpression of PVT1 promotes cervical cancer cells proliferation, cell cycle progression and migration, and depletion of PVT1 inhibits cervical cancer cell proliferation, cell cycle progression, and migration. Mechanistically, we verified that PVT1 binds to EZH2, recruits EZH2 to the miR-200b promoter, increases histone H3K27 trimethylation level on the miR-200b promoter, and inhibits miR-200b expression. Furthermore, the effects of PVT1 on cervical cell proliferation and migration depend upon silencing of miR-200b. Taken together, our findings confirmed that PVT1 functions as an oncogene in cervical cancer and indicated that PVT1 is not only an important prognostic marker, but also a potential therapy target for cervical cancer.

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Exploring multi-functional properties in a single material is the focus for future material design and applications. In this work, we investigated the multiferroic property of Cu doped ZnO films using a combination of X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), classical magnetometry and electric measurements. The results show that the texture of Cu doped ZnO films is deteriorated with an increase in Cu contents, whereas the dielectric property is improved due to the introduction of Cu ions. The XAS result reveals that the Cu atoms occupy the substitutional Zn sites in the ZnO host, and thus induce local electric dipoles owing to the displacement of the Cu-O bond. The presence of oxygen vacancies together with Cu ions facilitates the movement of the ferroelectric domain boundary, and contributes to the ferromagnetism due to the indirect exchange between Cu atoms and large-sized vacancy orbitals. The Cu doped ZnO film is a feasible promising candidate for applications in multiferroic devices.

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