Increased oncogenic microRNA-18a expression in the peripheral blood of patients with prostate cancer: A potential novel non-invasive biomarker

Abstract

Abstract.MicroRNAs have been demonstrated to be stably detectable in peripheral blood, thus representing important sources of non-invasive biomarkers of various diseases, including cancer. Recently, microRNA-18a (miR-18a) has been revealed to be highly expressed in prostate cancer (PC) tissues, acting as an oncogenic miRNA. The present study evaluated miR-18a expression in the peripheral blood of patients with PC, patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), and healthy individuals, to assess the feasibility of using peripheral blood miR-18a as a potential non-invasive biomarker for PC. Total RNA was extracted from peripheral whole blood samples from 24 PC patients, 24 BPH patients and 23 healthy control individuals. The expression of miR-18a was assessed by reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction. The results revealed that miR-18a expression was significantly higher in PC patients than in BPH patients and healthy controls [fold change (mean ± standard deviation), 5.5±1.4 for PC, 1.5±0.5 for BPH and 1.2±0.6 for controls; P<0.005]. Higher miR-18a expression was strongly associated with PC [odds ratio (OR), 4.602; 95% confidence interval (CI), 2.194-9.654; P=0.001], but was not significantly associated with BPH (OR, 1.2; 95% CI, 0.7-2.02; P=0.332). Despite the small number of patients, which limits the statistical power of the study, higher miR-18a expression was observed to be significantly correlated with certain clinicopathological parameters, including Gleason score >7 and pathological tumor stage 3/4 (P<0.005). A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis revealed that miR-18a discriminated PC patients from BPH patients and healthy controls [area under the curve (AUC), 0.805; 95% CI, 0.704-0.906). Furthermore, use of the ROC curve to discriminate PC from BPH patients yielded an AUC of 0.878 (95% CI, 0.783-0.972). In summary, the present results indicate that miR-18a expression is significantly increased in peripheral blood of patients with PC compared with that of BPH patients and healthy individuals, and that higher miR-18a expression is associated with progression of PC. Peripheral blood oncogenic miR-18a may serve as a potential novel non-invasive biomarker for PC that also facilitates discrimination between PC and BPH.

Identification of miRNA and mRNA expression profiles by PCR microarray in hepatitis B virus‑associated hepatocellular carcinoma

“…Additionally, overexpression of miR-18b accelerates cell proliferation and the loss of cell adhesion ability, and following surgical resection, patients with HCC exhibiting high miR-18b expression have a significantly shorter relapse-free period compared with those with low expression (37). Overall, the concentration of miR-18a in the plasma/serum of patients with cancer is increased compared with that of controls, and miR-18 may be a potential diagnostic biomarker for numerous types of cancer (35,38).…”

“…The oncogene c-Myc is the direct and functional target of miR-451. miR-451 downregulation-induced c-Myc overexpression leads to the activation of extracellular signal regulated kinase (ERK)1/2 signaling (38). miR-451 may also function as a potential suppressor of tumor angiogenesis by targeting interleukin-6 receptor-signal transducer and activator of transcription 3-vascular endothelial growth factor signaling in HCC (40).…”

Altered microRNA expression profiles in lung damage induced by nanosized SiO2

“…The common differentially expressed miRNAs of pulmonary injury in an early stage ( Previous studies have demonstrated RvD1 upregulated miR-21, miR-146b, and miR-219 and downregulated miR-208a in self-limited murine peritonitis at 12 h. 18 Other studies suggested that miR-208 is related to heart disease. [19][20][21] It played a role in cardiac fibrosis.At present the study of miR-212 mainly focus on the regulation effects of cancer, [22][23][24][25] it belongs to a member of the family of miR-132. Previous studies pointed out that some of the target genes of miR-132 mediated neural development, synaptic transmission, inflammation and angiogenesis.…”

“…In succession, the membrane was blocked by means of incubation in 5% nonfat dry milk at 25 C for 2 h. Incubation with primary monoclonal antibodies (as shown in Table 2) diluted in 5% filtered nonfat dry milk was conducted to overnight at 4 C after cleaning 3 times for 5 min at 25 C applying 1 £ TBST buffer. Following washing 3 times again with TBST for 10 min, PVDF membrane was incubated with goat antirabbit IgG antibody (1:10000) combined with 5% horseradish peroxidase (HRP) solution for 1h at 25 C. Results were mensurated utilizing strengthened ECL chemilluminescence and analyzed with the help of an automatic digital gel image analysis system (Tanon-5500, Shanghai, China).…”

Prostate cancer biomarkers: Are we hitting the mark?

“…Such assays have recently been shown to be elevated in prostate tissues, peripheral blood, and body fluids of PCa patients, but did not reveal the same increase in benign prostatic hypertrophy 40, 41. Their utility also lies in differentiating between patients with raised PSA from benign prostatic hypertrophy and clinically significant PCa, adding to the specificity of diagnosis.…”