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Gastric cancer (GC) is a common type of cancer, particularly in China. Numerous studies have demonstrated that circulating microRNAs (miRNAs) have potential applications as noninvasive biomarkers for cancer diagnosis and prognosis. Microarray-based serum miRNA profiling was performed on the serum of 12 paired pre- and post-operative GC patients to screen differentially expressed serum miRNAs. Twelve different serum miRNAs between pre- and post-operative GC patients were identified. Those miRNAs were verified by real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction in 110 paired pre- and post-operative serum samples from 55 GC patients. miR-20a was confirmed and demonstrated potential as a GC-associated biomarker. Furthermore, the levels of serum miR-20a were significantly different between GC, nasopharyngeal cancer, colorectal carcinoma, breast cancer and non-cancerous controls. In addition, it was found that serum miR-20a levels correlated with age, tumor stage, differentiated degree and lymph node metastasis in GC. Survival analysis indicated that GC patients with elevated levels of serum miR-20a had poor survival. Thus, serum miR-20a may serve as a molecular marker for diagnosis, evaluating therapeutic efficacy and prognosis, as well as monitoring recurrence in GC patients.

Heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein K (hnRNP K) is one of the major pre-mRNA-binding proteins, that is involved in translational modifications. In our previous studies, we found that hnRNP K is associated with human gastric cancer. The protein levels of hnRNP K were detected in cell lines and tissue microarrays. The correlation between hnRNP K expression and patient survival rate was evaluated by Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. In addition, we also detected hnRNP K expression in preoperative and postoperative serum samples from patients with gastric cancer, and serum samples from healthy volunteers. We found that hnRNP K was overexpressed in the gastric cancer cell lines. The levels of hnRNP K were significantly elevated in the gastric cancer tissues compared with that noted in the tumor-adjacent gastric mucosal and normal gastric mucosal sampes, and hnRNP K expression was found to correlate with tumor stage and lymph node metastasis. However, the level of serum hnRNP K did not differ significantly between gastric cancer patients and healthy volunteers. We also found that patients whose tumors showed elevated expression of hnRNP K had poor survival. The present study suggests that hnRNP K is a promising tissue biomarker for diagnosing gastric cancer and is a prognostic indicator for patients with gastric cancer.

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