AbstractmiRNAs are expected to become potential biomarkers in the diagnosis and prognosis of Esophageal cancer (EC). Through a series of screening, miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p were selected as EC-associated miRNAs. Based on AllGlo probe, a novel absolute quantitative RT-qPCR method with high sensitivity, specificity and accuracy was established for detecting miRNAs. Then the clinical significance of these 3 miRNAs was explored with 213 patients (166 cases with EC and 47 cases with benign diseases) and 170 normal controls. Compared with normal controls, the level of miR-34a-5p increased while miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p decreased in EC and benign patients (P < 0.001), and the level of miR-181a-5p in early EC patients was significantly lower (P < 0.001). According to logistic regression analysis, combined detection of miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and Cyfra21-1 provided the highest diagnosis efficiency of 85.07% with sensitivity and specificity reaching 85.45% and 84.71%. Compared with preoperative samples, the level of miR-34a-5p decreased while miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p increased in postoperative samples (P < 0.001). Collectively, this first developed, novel absolute quantitative RT-qPCR method exhibits high application value in detecting miRNAs, miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p may serve as potential biomarkers in the diagnosis and prognosis of EC, and miR-181a-5p probably could serve as a new biomarker for early EC.

DEAH-box helicase 32 (DHX32) is an RNA helicase with unique structural characteristics that is involved in numerous biological processes associated with RNA, including ribosome biosynthesis, transcription, mRNA splicing and translation. Increasing evidence suggests that abnormal DHX32 expression contributes to cancer initiation and development, due to dysregulated cell proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis and other processes. In the current review, the discovery, structure and function of DHX32, as well as the association between abnormal DHX32 expression and tumors are discussed. DHX32 expression is downregulated in acute lymphoblastic leukemia, but upregulated in solid tumors, including colorectal and breast cancer. Furthermore, DHX32 expression levels are associated with the pathological and clinical features of the cancer. Therefore, DHX32 may serve as a novel liquid biopsy marker for auxiliary diagnosis and prognosis screening, as well as a possible target for cancer therapy. The molecular mechanism underlying the contribution of DHX32 towards the initiation and development of cancer requires further investigation for the development of anticancer treatments based on manipulating DHX32 expression and function.

Background Esophageal cancer (EC) is a malignant tumor of esophagus with progressive dysphagia as the main clinical manifestation. miRNAs are expected to become potential biomarkers in diagnosis and prognosis of EC. Methods Based on AllGlo probes, a novel absolute quantitative RT-qPCR method was established to detect miRNAs. And the clinical diagnosis significance of the screened miRNAs was explored with 213 patients (166 cases with EC and 47 cases with benign diseases) and 170 normal controls. Results Through a series of screening, miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p were selected as EC-associated candidate miRNAs. Based on AllGlo probes, a novel absolute quantitative RT-qPCR method for detecting miRNAs was established with high sensitivity, specificity, good accuracy and no carryover contamination. Compared with normal controls, the level of miR-34a-5p increased while miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p decreased in EC and benign patients ( P <0.001), and the level of miR-181-5p in early EC patients was significantly lower ( P <0.001). According to logistic regression analysis, the combined detection of miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and Cyfra21-1 provided the highest diagnosis efficiency of 85.07% with sensitivity and specificity reaching 85.45% and 84.71%. Compared with preoperative samples, the level of miR-34a-5p significantly decreased while the levels of miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p significantly increased in the postoperative samples ( P <0.001). Conclusions Based on AllGlo probes, this first developed, novel absolute quantitative RT-qPCR method exhibits high application value in detecting miRNAs. miR-34a-5p, miR-148a-3p and miR-181a-5p may serve as potential biomarkers in the diagnosis and prognosis of EC, especially, miR-181-5p probably could be used as a new biomarker for early EC.

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